The young knitters continued their unbeaten run in 2023 with a hard fought 1-0 victory against arguably the best technical side they had met this season.

For a neutral this game was a fabulous game to watch with both sides playing nice football but finding it hard to break down some resolute defending. It would be fair to say that Hinckley had more of the ball in the first half, controlling the game with patient build up play, Hinckley’s first opportunity came when a channel ball to Jasper Clarke saw him skip past 2 RCW defenders and deliver a lovely ball into the box for Josh Mason to just head over the bar. More of the same came in the first half with Jasper and Calum causing issues down the wing for the home team.

Once again the counter press and energy in the Hinckley midfield made things increasingly difficult for Racing Club, who were unable to carve out an opportunity until the 35th Minute when a ball into the box was volleyed well over the Hinckley Crossbar. The entertaining football continued to half time with the game remaining goalless.

Three changes at half time saw Hinckley maintain their poise and control of the game, again with both sides looking to break the deadlock the game became tense with no team wanting to make a mistake. The first real opportunity in the second half came with Hinckley Captain Kian, collected the ball on the edge of the 18 yard box and with a nice piece of skill flicked the ball past the defender and then ran around to whip the ball back from the byline to Corey who fired over the bar from 12 yards. The Hinckley midfield continued to dominate creating several more chances, and were unlucky with Ben shooting from 25 yards out beating the keeper only to be denied from the post, Corey was denied again when he broke through to shoot from a tight angle only for the Racing Club keeper to make a fantastic save at his near post. The resulting corner saw Hinckley take the lead in a somewhat fortunate passage of play, when a deep corner to the back post was collected by Ed who drew in 2 defenders to cut the ball back to Joseph Marriott who proceeded to whip a cross into the box, which floated into the top corner of the goal, whilst fortunate it was well deserved.

Hinckley believed they had doubled the lead 5 minutes later when Kian whipped in a corner that was cleared back out to the corner of the 18 yard box, which Kian came on to an produced a curling shot which the keeper seemingly parried into his own net, but due to poor positional play from the linesman, the goal was not given. The Veo recording of the game does show the ball being pulled back over the line from the keeper. This led to a tense last 10 minutes where Racing Club through everything at Hinckley, however the Hinckley defence held out to keep their third clean sheet in a row.

Next Up .... Coton Green FC
Away , Monday 6th February 2023 7.45pm