The Galleon - Portsmouth's Official Student Newspaper

The first BUCS Wednesday after Christmas saw the University Men’s First XI Hockey team take three points against bottom of the league Imperial College London XI, in a match which produced as many cards as goals.

The Portsmouth team must have felt confident going into this game as the Imperial team were yet to win a game in this league, and Portsmouth had already beaten them 7-0 earlier in the season.

Portsmouth looked the stronger team and some excellent passing and individual skills meant they were able to threaten the Imperial goal in under five minutes. A well worked free hit found the net but was disallowed because Portsmouth had not touched the ball in the D.

Imperial battled hard and pushed up the pitch as a unit, which allowed Portsmouth to break with the ball moments later. An excellent passage of play from the home team saw Jacob Saunders send the ball into the back of the Imperial net with a first time shot.

Some interesting umpiring decisions and some slightly reckless challenges from captain Sam Druce and Andrew Mole meant both were sin-binned almost straight after each other, leaving the Portsmouth team to battle on with only nine men for almost ten minutes. Portsmouth managed to keep the Imperial team at bay long enough for Druce to return to the pitch and score with his first touch of the ball.

All eleven players were back on the pitch for a matter of seconds before another tackle was deemed dangerous by the umpire, making Greg Joys the third Portsmouth player to take an enforced ten minute break. Proving that they play better when they are a player down, Portsmouth pushed forward and won a short corner, which Sam Druce converted with some lovely individual skills and a flicked effort into the top corner. The score was 3-0 at half time.

Portsmouth began the second half the same way in which they ended the first, plenty of fight and aggression and another player, this time Saunders, upset the umpire and took a walk to the sin-bin.  It was obvious Portsmouth were frustrated with the umpiring decisions, especially when a goal was disallowed just ten minutes in for a reason that not even the umpires seemed sure about.

The fourth and final Portsmouth goal came near the end of the second half. It began with an Imperial College short corner, which was defended well and played out of danger with an excellent 70 yard pass to Saunders. The attacker held up play before sweeping the ball in to Seb Martin, who beat the keeper in a one-on-one.

The match finished 4-0 and means the Portsmouth first team remain at the top of the table with a hefty goal difference separating them from second place Brunel University.