stotfold 4 afc 1
Stotfold 4 AFC Dunstable 1 (3-1 Half time)
Southern League Central Division 1
New Roker Park (JSJ Stadium) Saturday 11th October 2025.
Attendance –
Match report by Tony Barbato.
On a fine and sunny Autumn afternoon, AFC travelled the relatively short journey to the other side of Bedfordshire to play Stotfold a team who just like us, have not enjoyed the best start to the season in the league. With both teams hovering in or just above the drop places at the time, this game was one that both teams would have wanted to secure maximum points from.
From the off it was quite clear that Stotfold would be happy to sit back in their shape and look to pick off any mistakes or opportunities on the counterattack. We were struggling to obtain any dominance in midfield during the opening exchanges and Stotfold from defence, pumped a long but accurate ball over the top down our left side that their No. 7 took down with a cute touch that set him up for the run on Carmichael, whom he beat to the line allowing him to whip in a low cross that was guided on the volley past Bonsu into the goal by Snee.
This kind of stirred AFC into something approaching a wake up with Sean Joseph spraying a long diagonal out to the right that JCA controlled and slipped through to Sam on his debut who then rounded their left back impressively and slipped a cross into the box that ended up being handled and the referee awarded a penalty on 6 mins. Kyle Brooks on his 100th appearance for AFC stepped up to place the kick but fired it at a charitable height to his left with the keeper palming the ball away to safety. For the next 10 mins Stotfold were continually rigid in their set up, denying us any space in the top third with attacking runs from Avto, Sam and Ikey petering out on each occasion. On 16 mins a cute interchange on the right hand side resulted in Joyce firing one over the bar that ended up hitting a dog walker on the out-skirts of Hitchin. Our opponents continued to look for balls to the channels with their No.7 posing our left sided defenders a lot of questions.
However, on 26 Brooks, Ikey and Max completed a tight interchange of passes resulting in an accurate through ball from Max to Ikey who was one on one with their keeper whom he fired the ball straight at. However, after a double re-bound the ball looped over the floored keeper and into the open net. It was now 1-1 and on the balance of play that would seem to be a fair return. The game continued in the same vane with Stotfold breaking up our midfield possession wherever possible and looking to turn us round quickly. On 31 mins we again lost the ball in midfield and a further ball over the top found Snee in acres of space and he took the ball down calmly and sent an intelligent lob over a stretched Bonsu from some 25 yards. The organisation of the AFC defence at this stage was starting to become frayed and after loosing possession cheaply on the right, a Stotfold midfielder played a defence splitting pass through to their No.7 who neatly fired low and hard into the far corner for 3-1. AFC continued to broadly possess the ball but in areas of the pitch that were not going hurt our opponents who showed greater maturity in being both organised and patient. Time after time our attacks fizzled out looking for a killer pass through space that was just not available. On 44 Avto and Carmichael were replaced by Blennerhassett and Tali.
At the resumption of the 2nd half it was clear that Stotfold would quite righty sit back and protect their road to 3 points. We started to exert a bit more physical dominance in midfield after the shape change and we buzzed out on the left and the right for the first 10 mins resulting in 2 or 3 half chances being created but our shooting continued to be somewhat wayward and visibly nervous. On 55 minutes Sam Bajaha was changed with Wits and AFC to their credit continued to push forward with some particularly effective work down our right side resulting in Brooks on 58 mins setting up Blennerhassett in the area but again the finish looked forced and seemed to epitomise what we would be taking back to Dunstable. At this point JCA was subbed off for Aaron at right back. Ikey continued to press down the left and was reasonably productive with a couple of crosses that were either claimed by the keeper or cleared by their defence. Joyce after good interplay with Tali popped off a shot saved by the keeper in the 69th minute and he was then himself replaced by Tyrone for his debut. On 76 minutes Stotfold made a rare foray up the field that resulted in a corner that an un-marked defender headed onto our post.
After more AFC pressure we were awarded a throw level with their area on 81 mins. The ball was sent in long but the keeper grabbed it and immediately kicked long over the top of our remaining defenders, and their lone forward drove strongly through to goal and smashed the ball home to make it 4-1.
In summary we basically had our pants pulled down by an older and more experienced team that retained their 2 banks of 4 throughout the game to deny us any real space to play in other than in our own defence. Every time we attacked we were met with a brick wall whereas on the day we appeared to lack any defensive solidarity and connection between with midfield despite our higher levels of possession throughout. This is a real shame because against a superb Folkstone team and against Real Bedford we showed great periods of intelligent and committed defensive play that kept us in both games until the very end.
It was great shame for our Captain Kyle Brooks, who again led with commitment and energy on his milestone appearance for the club. The good thing is that it’s still very early days in the league and things will get better for this team. Keep going chaps – it was a bad day at the office and nothing more, but please let’s try to learn from the experience.
AFC Starting Line up:
Bonsu, JCA, Carmichael, Max, Joseph, Lynch, Ikey, Avtandil, Joyce, Brooks, Bajaha
Subs (all came on)
Addy, Lucas, Shiham, Jallo, Blennerhasset, Wits
