Tournament Reviews

2016 saw us enter our second consecutive Keith Walwyn Tournament, with the one-day event this time taking place on Saturday 25th June. There was to be a slight change in the competition format from the previous year however; with teams now being split into three groups (2 x 6 and 1 x 7) instead of the two larger ones there were last time around. Once again though, all sides would still then go through to a knockout stage to play for one of the three trophies (with final group positions determining which). Our eight-man squad for the day was made up of Clunj regulars Adam, Rob, Seddy, Tomas and Mark, with Joe and Luke then coming in to make one-off returns, and Fletch also helping us out.

As is usually the case with these annual events, we went into our opener against York Phoenix not knowing too much about the opposition - and this therefore resulted in us making quite a slow start to proceedings. However it soon became clear that we did possess the greater quality players, and so by stepping up our game we then went on to record a comfortable 3-0 victory thanks to a goal from Joe and a well-taken brace by Rob. Now full of confidence, the latter would then go on to open the scoring from the penalty spot in our second match against Bing Bong FC, with Joe once again joining him on the scoresheet as we came away with a deserved 2-0 win. Then for the same man, our next fixture against Unreal Madrid would prove to be one of the most memorable ties he would probably ever play in - as not only did he manage to find the net five times in only a ten minute game, but this also included a hattrick which was amazingly scored inside just 34 seconds.

Our next group match then saw us face a Le Saux Solid Crew side that we had beaten in the quarter finals of the previous year's tournament - although this time round these same players had been entered as a 'B' team. The tie itself would prove to be a very tight one though with few clear cut chances, although Tomas did have to make a couple of decent saves (amazingly his first of the day) to ensure another clean sheet as it finished goalless. This was actually the first points either side had dropped all day however, and so going into our final group fixture there was still plenty to play for, especially as our next opponents Huntington Forest were only a point behind us in the standings. It was then therefore little surprise that this would also go on to be another closely-fought encounter - but a single second-half winner from Joe would be enough to decide it and ensure we finished top, whilst also meaning that we had impressively gone the entire group stage without conceding a single goal.

The draw for the knockout stages then saw us paired against Le Saux Solid Crew 'A' - and having already played a close game against their 'B' team earlier in the day, we knew this would likely be an even tougher test. Unfortunately that would prove to be exactly the case though; as aside from Luke striking the post early on, we would fail to really break down their solid defence, whilst at the other end they would prove clinical in front of goal as they took their only real chances to eventually run out 3-0 victors. This initially left us feeling hugely disappointed - especially having blitzed through the group phase. But watching some of the other teams in the latter stages it became clear there were some really talented outfits left vying for the trophy, and so in the end it could be seen as a respectable achievement overall that we made it to the QUARTER FINALS stage.