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Havant & Waterlooville v Dartford

Havant & Waterlooville v Dartford

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Report

Havant and Waterlooville 0-0 Dartford

Joe Brophy

Dartford are still waiting to pick up their first win of the new season after failing to break down newly promoted Havant and Waterlooville.

The Darts remain unbeaten so far with three points from three games but Tony Burman will rue his sides missed chances as they looked to kickstart their expected promotion push.

A growing injury list saw Ofori-Acheampong, Pugh and Vint all ruled out.

The hosts started the match and had the first chance within minutes as a deep cross from Prior was almost converted from close range by Waddrington but the striker could only send his effort wide.

Havant and Waterlooville applied much of the games early pressure and exercised use of the channels well. Another good passage of play down the right saw Fogden force Ibrahim to keep on his toes with a drilled shot.

The momentum soon began to switch in favour of the Darts. Having withheld the early storm, Dartford looked to gather a foothold in the game by spraying the ball around comfortably in midfield to keep possession.

The first real chance for the away side came from the head of Bonner, who connected with a Sho-Silva cross but his attempt glided wide of the mark.

From then on, it was all one-way traffic. Finding great success on the flanks with the pace and trickery of Hayes and Della-Verde, the home side struggled to deal with several dangerous crosses with one in particular finding its way to Bradbrook in plenty of space outside the box but he failed to find the target.

All the Darts attacking efforts could have been undone when Prior believed he was fouled in the box but the referee waved away the claims.

An even second half followed with many of the attacks being cancelled out, the game plan for both sides was to get the ball wide and then into the box but both defences were well up to the task.

Whilst he had his defence to thank for doing most of the work, Havant keeper Young was called into action and responded spectacularly by pushing a seemingly goal bound effort from Bradbrook wide from six yards out.

Tony Burman turned to Mfula off the bench to provide the clinical instinct that was all that was missing from Dartford’s performance and was almost rewarded instantly.

Mfula took on Molyneaux on the wing and drove at the Havent defence and almost scored a terrific goal.

Not wanting to be outshone, Havent substitute Rutherford displayed some dancing feet in the Darts penalty area before feeding Lewis who should have opened the scoring.

Waddrington then gave away a silly free kick after fouling Della-Verde and Sho-Silva almost made him pay, rising highest to steer Noble’s delivery just shy of the far post.

In the dying embers of the match, Havent narrowly failed to snatch the winner as a bouncing ball in the box was poked into the arms of a grateful Ibrahim to hold onto his clean sheet.

 

HAVANT AND WATERLOOVILLE TEAM: Young, Robinson, Williams, Carter, Molyneaux, Harris, Fogden, Lewis, Prior, Tubbs, Widdrington

HAVANT AND WATERLOOVILLE SUBS: Woodford, Barker, Stock, Rutherford, Hayter

DARTFORD FC TEAM: Ibrahim, Harris, Sho-Silva, Bonner, Onyemah, Noble, Hayes, Brown, Bradbrook, Della-Verde, Murphy

DARTFORD FC SUBS: Mfula, Cue, Eweka, Wood, Coxall

Attendance: 775

Details

Date Time League Season Full Time
August 12, 2017 3:00 pm National League South 2017/2018 90'

Ground

Westleigh Park
Martin Rd, Havant PO9, UK

Results

ClubGoalsOutcome
Havant & Waterlooville0Draw
Dartford0Draw

Dartford