Fareham miss chances, toss away lead

Fareham were left to rue a catalogue of missed first half opportunities as they allowed Olton & West Warwicks to wipe out a two-goal deficit and force a late 3-3 draw at Henry Cort.
They looked in command on the back of goals by Alex Boxall and Chris Davey, but despite restoring their lead through Kieran Page’s maiden national league goal, were hit by an Olton sucker pinch equaliser four minutes from the end.
“The first half was a very dominant performance but again, we lacked the killer touch to score more goals,” sighed frustrated Fareham boss Ben Barnes.
“"We pressed well, but we did not inject our three penalty corners accurately enough, which cost us.
"A fair scoreline at half-time would have been 5-0, which is something an Olton player said after the game."
“But they deserved to get back into it in the second half as we stopped playing our style of hockey."
Fareham were one-up inside eight minutes and, but for a series of fine saves by Alex Cook, might have had more than a second by Davey to enhance Barnes’s  half-time team talk.
Olton weren't finished, however, and made their physical presence known in the second half as they sought to knock Fareham off their stride.
Indeed, as the game became more fractious, the Midlands side grew into the game and managed to convert a penalty corner through defender Chris Beck.
They then equalised through a 56th minute strike by Martin Ebbage.
As the game became stretched, Kieran Page (pictured above)  scored his maiden West Conference goal with a sweetly-struck reverse stick effort.
The goal seemed to have won it for the home side, but Olton had the last laugh.
Having won a penalty corner directly from the restart, they worked the ball around the circle for Dan Sulway to push it high over the on-rushing George Harris in the Fareham goal.
Performance Director Ben Barnes was frustrated with the result, and felt his team should have got the three points.
"I felt we deserved to win. Niall Stott had an influential game, and I'm delighted that Kieran Page got his first National League goal.
"But ultimately, it was a frustrating final result." he added.
Page also hit the mark in Fareham II’s 4-3 defeat at Croydon, where George Davey and Luke Gould were also on target.

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