Bedfont Sports 0
Jersey Bulls 2
Davison 81(og), Boyle 90HT: 0-0Player of the match: James Querée
SATURDAY, 10 February 2024. A date which will have lingered in the minds of Jersey Bulls supporters for months.
Having won through to the last-16 stage of the FA Vase, Falmouth were the visitors to the Island that day – close to 1,400 fans at a packed Springfield expectant of witnessing history as their men sought a quarter-final spot for the first time in the club’s young history.
A day which began in hope ended in misery, the visitors claiming a 3-0 win which few predicted and only made the play-off defeat against Knaphill a few months later even more unpalatable.
Whisper it, but over the course of a summer, we really are starting to see a new version of the Bulls.
The 2-0 win over Bedfont Sports in London on Saturday, showcased everything they have become. Disciplined. Prepared. Dominant.
You would have won big money not long ago if you’d have called Bulls winning a game of this magnitude without the likes of Lorne Bickley, Luke Campbell and Jay Giles – remember them?
But such is the evolution Elliot Powell has overseen. Meticulous by nature, results-driven in outcome.
Bedfont are a hardened, experienced outfit – not long out of Step Four – and they’ve started their season well in the Combined Counties Premier North Division, the sister league to that in which the Bulls operate.
Powell and his staff, though, were clearly well prepared and the game plan to subdue, disarm and then engage worked perfectly.
If the 6-0 dismantling of Knaphill showed their offensive armoury, this showed an ability to win confrontation’s.
If one man typifies this new regime, it’s Toby Ritzema.
Covering almost every strand of the pristine artificial surface at Sports, he was the man to go closest for the Bulls in a tight first half, but without sufficiently troubling Frankie Beckles in the home goal.
As the contest wore on, you could feel the tension rising – but only from one side of the ground.
It is a further sign of where this Bulls team is headed that the calmness radiating from the Bulls bench, players and supporters has not been seen in previous pressure moments, and that added to Bedfont’s irritation.
Irritation turned to panic with ten minutes to go.
Jonny Le Quesne, on one of his familiar gallops deep into the heart of opposition territory, rounded his man before hitting a shot – some might suggest a cross – which took a deflection before landing in the Bedfont net.
Knowing how Powell operates, penalty preparations would have been well underway by that stage but on the next sheet in his notepad would have been a section titled ‘Seeing the game out at 1-0’. Every base is covered.
As the hosts threw numbers forward, while ringing the changes off the bench, you felt the men in white knew they’d get another moment to kill the game off and it arrived with a minute to go, presented to Jack Boyle. Coolness of mind, and execution of deed, are difficult to marry but that is exactly what Boyle did, using all his nous and technical skill to wait for Beckles to commit, calmly proceeding to knock the ball past him.
That was that. Yet another clean sheet – into the next round – and still no one has lowered Bulls’ colours this year.
The evolution is quickly turning into revolution.
Jersey Bulls: Euan Van Der Vliet, Jonny Le Quesne, Fraser Barlow, James Querée (c), Harry Curtis, Luke Watson, Toby Ritzema, Joe Kilshaw, Kieran Lester, Jack Boyle, James Carr. Substitutes: Francis Lekimamati (for Lester 75), Sammy Sutcliffe (for Ritzema 90+1), Rai Dos Santos (not used).
Bedfont Sports: Frankie Beckles, Trisdon Andrews, Josh Eatwell (c), George Frise, Ollie Davison, Adam Sewell, Jake Woods, Chris Sawyer, Tyler Robinson, Jude Jakes-McKay, Jared Myers. Substitutes: Charlie Cushion (for Eatwell 90+2), Jamie Pike (for Sewell 83), London Bradshaw (not used), George Maxwell (for Sawyer 58), Ebraim Devanna-Ngungi (for Myers 78).
