CITY SLIP TO HOME DEFEAT

CITY slipped to a home defeat in a high-scoring encounter against fellow high-flyers, Sporting Khalsa.
The visitors rattled the woodwork within the opening two minutes, whilst at the other end, Jamie Smith went on a positive run before getting in a strike that was pushed away by the visiting ‘keeper.
We were starting to get into our attacking stride as Dave Reynolds did well out wide before linking up with Mark Danks who fired over.
Nathan Vaughan saved well to deny the visitors but they drew first blood shortly afterwards when a corner wasn’t properly cleared and Jeys was on hand to turn the ball home.
The woodwork was rattled again when Danks tried his luck with a curling effort but we fell two goals behind with ten minutes to go until the break when a corner caused problems and the visitors were able to profit.
It got worse soon afterwards when Jeys curled a third goal into the top corner to give us a mountain to climb at 3-0 down going into the second half.
The second period started with Alex Tomkinson putting a free-kick over as we started with purpose but failed to find the final pass.
Jeys completed his hat-trick when he waltzed past a couple of defenders before confidently guiding the ball beyond Vaughan to make it 4-0.
We managed to get a goal back just before the hour-mark when an effort from George Forsyth was pushed out by the ‘keeper and Reynolds was alert to turn the rebound home.
There were appeals for a City penalty in the wake of the goal as Baldwin was brought down but the referee waved away the appeals.
A loose ball in the middle of the park almost presented Jeys with another goal only for Vaughan to come to the rescue with a smart save.
After Bannister went close for the visitors, we further reduced the arrears when Tomkinson found the net with 20 minutes to go.
The visitors were starting to wobble as Jamie Smith lashed the ball home from distance to make it 4-3 and set up a grandstand finish.
Our hopes of grabbing a share of the spoils were hit when Bannister’s strike was saved by Vaughan but as the ball rolled agonisingly towards the line, Jeys was able to get there ahead of Forsyth to poke home for his fourth and Sporting Khalsa’s fifth goal of the game.
Late on Jamie Smith saw his strike deflected into the path of Moran whose attempt was blocked as the visitors held on to claim a 5-3 victory on a heavy pitch.

CITY: Vaughan, Weir, J.Smith, Stoddart, Thomas (M. Smith), Hayward, Danks (Baldwin), Birch, Reynolds, Forsyth, Tomkinson (Moran). Subs not used: Birley, Gwynne.
GOAL(S): Reynolds, Tomkinson, J. Smith.
ATTENDANCE: 375.