Loddiswell Reserves: Teague, Rowe, A.Tapper (B.Rogers 45min), S.Elliott,
D.Stathers (C), Raymont, T.Stathers, Tucker, Guard, A.Edmonds,
R.Tapper (Williams 45min).

Loddiswell went into their final fixture of the season in good spirits, maybe too relaxed, as undoubtedly bottom club Newton United Reserves will feel they should have come away with something from the game.

Within the first 20 minutes the visitors, but for some poor finishing, could have been four or five up as Lodd's struggled to clear any high ball into the box. However, when the hosts did get the ball down, and start passing it around, they looked a threat and great inter play between Chris Guard and Andy Edmonds saw the latter net his and Loddiswell's first of the game. This was closely followed Lodd's second, after Dan Stathers fed the ball down the left to brother Tim, his cross into the book was met by Edmonds who made no mistake with the shot.

Newton were still causing problems from corners and crosses into the box and but for a fantastic reaction save from Teague, would have got a goal back before half-time. As it was Reserve team Golden Boot winner, Andy Edmonds, completed his hat-trick to take Lodds in 3-0 up at the break.

Despite the score line, manager Chris Guard, was in no mood to let the 3-0 lead gloss over a particularly lacklustre performance by the greens, and reminded the players that a good win today could see the team move up the Division Four table.

The second half saw a slight improvement, however, it was Newton who scored first when a break from a Loddiswell corner was finished well by their centre-forward. Lodds failed to get any sort of rhythm going and were again put under pressure every time Newton won a corner or free-kick outside the box.

Again though, it was a case of not taking their chances and with ten left to play, they were made to rue those missed opportunities when Lodd's Sean Raymont fired in from the edge of the box to make it 4-1. Not content with his last gem of a strike, Raymont followed it up moments later with another strike from outside the box to complete the scoring at 5-1.

This was not a performance to shout about for Lodds, although the quality of the goals went a long way to make up for this, however, with Stoke Gabriel 3rds losing later in the day, the Reserves took 7th place in Division Four, only six points off 4th. Add to this their run to the Semi-Final stage of the Fred Hewings Cup, all involved will be very satisfied with the 2009/10 campaign.

Roll on 2010/11 season....