Hard Week For Mardy

Mainly in the North of England, the word mardy is used to describe someone as grumpy or not happy but it could be applied to Mardy Football club after defeat at home to Panteg in midweek before a 0-6 defeat away to table topping Albion Rovers on Saturday. However, never has the phrase "Sometimes adversity is what you need to face in order to become succesful" seemed more appropriate than after Saturday's game when looking for positives.

The team is currently suffering from a shortage of players because of injuries, holidays and unavailability with the club fielding a weakened team in midweek which had lost even more players by the weekend to the extent that, rather than call off the game, the team that took the field on Saturday comprised five who were playing  under 16's football last season in Josh Parfitt, Ellis Morgan, Oli Shooter, Charlie Morris, and Alfie Nicol. At the other end of the age spectrum were 49 year old keeper Ben Shooter (father of Oli), and the evergreen 47 year old Mark Hughes who didn't seem to stop running all afternoon. Assistant manager Daniel Grist also stepped in for his debut to captain the team and did much to keep the Rovers attack at bay with the usual 100% contribution from fellow centre back Stephen Woodhouse. The rest of the team consisted of 20 year old Luke Morgan and last year's second team captain Max Williams whilst on the bench, also making their debut, were Connor Power, Morgan Wait and Ryan Hughes (son of Mark).

Turning to the actual game rather than the build-up, Rovers went one up through Luke Hughes after ten minutes with further goals coming before the interval from Tom Shipley and Ciaran Rawlings. Shipley scored again after the break and Rawlings completed a hat trick just after the hour mark with some visiting players looking almost out on their feet. However, the Mardy bench added some energy and, rather than throw the towel in, the team gritted their teeth and prevented any more goals being conceded rather than allow the score to become one of an embarrassing nature. 

On Wednesday evening, skipper Nathan Price gave Mardy the lead before Panteg went 4-1 ahead. Price then grabbed his second of the evening in the second half before his team made a strong finish to the game and came close to scoring on several occasions, finally going down 2-4.

This week, Mardy are at home to Coed Eva Athletic on Wednesday evening before entertaining Premier Division team Cefn Forest on Saturday in the County Motors Challenge Cup.

Mardy manager Dai Sadler gives his team a post match pep talk after Saturday's game.