Sholing McLean Up at Wembley

Hopperational details
Date & Venue	Saturday 10 May 2014 at Wembley Stadium
Result	Sholing 1 West Auckland Town 0
Competition	FA Vase – Final (Step 5)
Hopping	18th visit to the “new” Wembley and here to support Sholing FC.
Pre-match preparation
Both teams have had very heavy fixture workloads in recent times given their fixture pileups.  Sholing have taken the Wessex League title and will return to step 4 after this season of voluntary demotion (assuming they choose to do so).  West Auckland finished 5th in the Northern League.  Here are their respective routes to Wembley. First Round: Winchester City 0-1 Sholing West Auckland 5-0 South Shields Second Round: Follands Sports 1-2 Sholing West Auckland 1-0 Shildon Third Round: Reading Town 1-4 Sholing West Auckland 2-1 Billingham Synthonia Fourth Round: Sholing 3-1 Hullbridge Sports Whickham 1-3 West Auckland (aet) Fifth Round: Sholing 1-0 Larkhall Athletic West Auckland 2-0 Hallen Sixth-Round: Sholing 1-0 Wisbech Town Dunston UTS 0-1 West Auckland Semi-Final: Sholing 6-4 Eastbourne United (aggregate – 2-2 & 4-2) West Auckland 2-1 St Andrews (aggregate – 0-0 and 2-1) EXCLUSIVE TO MHR: Sholing FC have arrived at Wembley and places are set in the changing room. (Pic Credit to Dave Fear of Sholing FC)
This match in one sentence
A close and often tense encounter won by a solitary goal and with the Sholing goalkeeper nominated as the official man-of-the-match.
So what?
Sholing are the first southern winners of the FA Vase for seven seasons after a period of Northern League domination.  They will be presented to the crowd at St Mary's before the Southampton v Manchester United game on Sunday. For West Auckland, the tough experience (though still a great achievement for a step 5 club) of losing at Wembley twice in three years.
The drama unfolds
With hindsight, the first half was forgettable but I reckon that was in the plan for both sides, who paced themselves ready for a full 90 or 120 minutes.  Sholing keeper Matt Brown, or his feet anyway, were called into action after five minutes after a great through ball set John Campbell free.  Sholing’s first chance fell to Lee Wort five minutes later but this time the other keeper Jordan Nixon was able to block.  I took my scene-setter clip at around the midpoint of the first half.  The sides are “sparring” rather than beating each other up.  Sholing are in red and white. West Auckland’s Andrew Green got the first yellow card of the day for a late tackle.  The best chance so far then fell to Sholing’s Marvin McLean who curled a shot wide when the top corner looked inviting, but West Auckland replied with chances of their own.  My second clip, just before the break, shows Brown flying across the goal to save a freekick from Rob Briggs.  0-0 at half-time The second half was better from the start as the rain started.  Sholing made a good start territorially and a shot from distance went just wide.  Barry Mason was then denied by an instinctive save from Nixon, before Mattie Moffat shot over the bar at the other end.  Sholing’s Lewis Fennemore went in the book for a missed tackle as the ground conditions worsened with the rain and players began to tire a little.  Campbell had another half-chance and another Sholing defender, Lee Bright, saw yellow.  That tackle was late enough to be recorded on the next page of the diary.  The only goal of the game came amid sun and showers.  The credit goes to Marvin McLean but there was maybe a deflection which helped the ball to loop slowly over Nixon.  If not, it was a clever disguised chip.  1-0 after 71 mins Let the celebrations begin!  1-0 West Auckland could have levelled immediately as a low driven cross fizzed right through the six-yard box, and Sholing looked to be rocking at the back as West Auckland were forced to press forward.  Brown removed any lingering doubt in the man-of-the-match adjudicator’s mind with a flying save followed by another at his near post, and another just to underline his contribution  This was another flyer to tip over a freekick from Steven Richardson.  Sholing sub Alex Sawyer ended up in the book and as the match entered stoppage time, West Auckland’s Brian Close was booked for a cynical foul but there was still time for them to hit the woodwork with moments to go.  So close to extra-time, but Sholing won this trophy with a sound all-round performance with no weak links and backed up with a keeper in great form. Here's the clip from the closing stages which shows how close West Auckland came to getting a shot at extra time.  Final score 1-0 Joy and despair in equal measure: Classy from West as they watch the rest of the presentation
Ground Pix
Match Pix
Huddle Stats
Nothing to report today.
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats
Green for Sholing beat Blue for West Auckland. 2013-14 Summary so far: 3pts for a win, 1pt for a draw, -1pt for a goal conceded and +5pts for a clean sheet P W D L GA (-1 each) CS (5 each) Pts Pts per Game Purple 1 1 0 0 0 1 8 8.00 Grey 12 7 2 3 13 5 35 2.92 Red 3 2 0 1 3 1 8 2.67 Green 12 6 1 5 16 3 18 1.50 Yellow 5 1 2 2 9 1 1 0.20 Orange 3 1 1 1 6 0 -2 -0.67 Radioactive Bile 3 1 0 2 6 0 -3 -1.00 Pink 7 1 3 3 16 0 -10 -1.43 Blue 4 0 1 3 7 0 -6 -1.50
What Next?
Watch @GrahamYapp on Twitter for details!