WEYMOUTH 2

PORTSMOUTH & SOUTHSEA 1

A GOAL in the last two minutes of the game from right-back Simon Harvey secured a first win in four weeks for Weymouth.

The Seasiders now move back into second position in Hampshire Division One, five points behind leaders Gillingham.

With the scores level throughout most of the fixture, neither team relaxed into the game and chances and possession were regularly squandered.

After a cagey start, Weymouth converted first. Without options in midfield, Harvey picked out forward Aaron Wilkinson at the top of the circle from his team’s half. Wilkinson drew defenders and the Portsmouth goalkeeper and found Patrick May’s diagonal run to the right.

The keeper couldn’t recover ground to stop May’s flick into the empty net from a tight angle.

The lead did nothing to settle the Seasiders’ nerves and no rhythm was found.

Portsmouth played the ball through midfield with relative ease and repeatedly played in their forwards one on one with the Weymouth centre-backs David Beaudro and Giles Broadhead.

Midfielder Daniel Bowles and left-back Michael Westlake both spent time in the sin bin for reckless challenges.

However, with help from Weymouth keeper David Civil, the hosts shut out the visitors in the first half.

Notably Beaudro deflected a shot bound for the bottom right corner from a penalty corner to save Civil’s blushes.

Civil himself made several good saves during this period of pressure.

Skipper Steven Membury tried to calm his team at the break and despite immediate pressure from Portsmouth at the restart, Weymouth held the ball well and looked the more likely of the two sides to score as the second half progressed.

The tide turned, however, after forward Luke Drewitt was harshly sin-binned for a diving tackle deemed dangerous by the umpire.

With the numerical advantage the visitors overloaded on the right. The Portsmouth right-back was tracked by May on the overlap but managed to cut a ball back from the base line.

The pass found a fellow forward that had shaken off Beaudro and had space to turn the ball into the goal.

With around 20 minutes remaining, the game could have swung in either team’s favour with neither taking the initiative.

Weymouth were given a lifeline when a Portsmouth player received a technical red card for a second offence, reducing the visitors to 10 men. The Seasiders piled on the pressure but as the clock counted down it started to look like Portsmouth had done enough to save the draw. However, with maybe two minutes to play and the ball driven into the visitors’ circle, some last-ditch swings of the stick from Membury and Westlake guided the ball across goal away from the approaching keeper where Harvey was on hand to bundle the ball over line.

Although relieved to claim three points, this was not a performance upon which Weymouth could realistically hope to recover their title challenge.

With two fixtures left before the Christmas break, away at Yateley and Southampton University, the Seasiders will need to raise their game to start 2017 as title hopefuls.

Man of the Match: Simon Harvey