As St. John's arrived, they found that the St. Augustine's pitch was very soft after recent rain. Last time they visited they didn't do so well, letting in 2 goals in the last 3 minutes, but they hoped to put up a good fight this time.

St. Augustine's passed about well, used the right wing which gave them a lot of chances. Alex, Simon and David wouldn't let them through and were as solid as a brick wall.  St. John’s finally broke through about 5 minutes into the match when Nick had an unlucky shot which the goalie picked up. The goalkeeper had a good goal kick, but Alex Drummod was on the end of it, took it down well, put it on his right foot and smashed it back towards the goal, where the goalie half caught it, but, to Alex's luck, dropped it and went in.

Simon gave away a corner, but Michael Gent caught it, despite a damaged finger. Still St.Augustine's couldn't get through the St. John’s defence. St. John’s passing suddenly improved and they broke through to give Greg Lowe his first goal. The half time score was 2-0 to St. John’s.  Both St.Augustine's and St. Johns had really good chances, but the goalies saved them. The St. Augustine’s goalie started to get indestructible and saved basically all of Nick and Greg's shots. Suddenly, out of the blue, the ball came to Greg's feet, and he whacked it over the goalkeeper's head to put St. John's 3-0 ahead.

St. Augustine’s heads still didn't drop, and they got together a good attack and scored leaving Michael stunned on the mud as the ball rolled over the line!  Again and again St. Augustine's kept trying to dominate the match, and eventually a well worked move down the right led to a cross shot which Michael could not hold. At .3-2, the gap was closing, but as St. Augustine’s mounted yet another attack, the whistle blew to take a relieved St. John’s through to the semi-finals.

Jonathan Butler