South Mixed's first match of the season saw them up against, and ultimately outplayed and outclassed by, a strong Cambridge City line-up that included both male and female East Premier players. South coach, Sean, to take one random example…

The opening half started well for South, with the defence of Matt Bailey, Keith Simpson, Chris Graveling and Emma Clarke preventing City for getting too close to keeper Jonny Bartram for the opening quarter hour. Good midfield work from Chris Baker and Jim Thorpe saw South have a couple of good chances to take the lead, with lively forward Nick Wong drawing good saves from the City keeper. City then nicked a scrappy goal but the play continued to switch from end-to-end, with good running from Pippa Noon and Claire Roberts giving the midfield options to hit.

Unfortunately, despite some good saves from Bartram, two more City goals in the last few minutes of the half saw South turn around 3-0 down.

The second half was a slightly different story. A change in City’s tactics saw the South midfield overworked, then overran, as the rest of their team tired around them. A number of City goals followed, with only Bartram’s heroics somewhat stemming the flow.

After a very rocky fifteen minutes, South began to string some play together again. This was manifested by good feeding of the ball into playmaker Chris Baker, who was causing the City defence problems with his fine distribution of the ball. Typical of this was another near thing from Wong, as he reacted like lightening to Barker’s driven ball in, got a touch in front of the keeper but saw his deflection flash inches wide of the top corner.

Soon afterward, first when Wong was clean through, and then when a six-on-two counter-attack was squandered due to heavy touches, the feeling that South were never going to score took hold. But lo, ten minutes from time, they did just that. More good work from Thorpe and Baker produced a ball into the D, to which Wong react faster than the City keeper and his little glance rolled under the keeper's foot and home. A quick response from City to get to double figures did little to alter the overall perspective of the match.

Not the greatest result but given the gulf in class between the two sides, not a great surprise. And as such, everyone seemed to enjoy their run around.