By CCFC Sid
January 9 2004

11,400 turned up to see CCFC's first game in the "Worlds Best Club Competition", with the 2,500 away fans making far more noise than the home supporters. Even when CCFC fans were taunted with chants of "Will You Ever Sing At Home?", they failed to respond. Why so quiet, lads? Peterboro created the games first couples of chance, with Burton shooting wide, then seeing Ward tip his second effort over the bar.

As well as the D2 side looking the more likely to score early on, it became quite clear whose side the referee was on, with Mr. Knight giving them 99%+ of the decisions.

Safri was harshly booked less than 10 minutes into the game, and, with Peterboro's penchant for "falling over rather easily", the odds on him staying on the pitch for 90 minutes looked rather bleak - thankfully he did.

Soon after, he hit a fine 30 yard effort that must have stung the hands of Tyler (Who looked extremely short for a goalkeeper!) in the Peterboro goal.

Joachim, possibly having read my article in the CET(!), finally showed he really does have pace, but his efforts came to nil. A minute later his over-hit cross eluded everybody, and he was guilty of the same crime on 35 minutes. Crossing with pace is all very well, but you have to give people the slightest chance of getting on the end of your efforts....

Twenty-five minutes in, a CCFC corner fell to Warnock, but his cross was missed by all. The next passage of play saw CCFC's supporters finally wake up when Williams clearly threw a punch at Safri. Despite this being a sending off offence in the eyes of most, the referee chose to ignore the incident.

Minutes later, CCFC enjoyed a decent spell of pressure, with McSheffrey, Konjic, and Joachim all missing chances, and Davenport once again going close with a headed effort from a corner.

Soon after, a Peterboro corner was cleared only as far as Williams, whose finely struck shot was saved well by Ward. This would have been an injustice on CCFC had it gone in, as said player shouldn't have even been on the pitch.

The second half started with a catalogue of terrible decisions by the referee, Barry Knight. He missed a blatant hand-ball which could have resulted in a penalty; a blatant foul on Davenport that saw no advantage to CCFC by playing on; a foul given against Adebola for merely standing still; McSheffrey penalised for daring to try and pass an opponent; then Knight ignored a torrent of abuse from Arber that other referees might have given a red card for.

Then, following an hour of fairly dire fare, a superb McSheffrey free-kick gave CCFC an unlikely lead. Peterboro were penalised for a foul, which they strongly protested against the awarding of, resulting in the referee finally getting something right by moving the ball forward 10 yards. An excellent curled effort, worthy of the man that seemingly doesn't rate him (Mr. McAllister), gave the Peterboro keeper no chance. If this is what the Coventry Kid is capable of from a set piece, he should be selected on that ability alone - let alone anything else he can do! To say that he was pleased to score would be an under-statement....

Two minutes later Joachim scored a controversial goal, and gave Barry Fry the chance to blame the defeat on everybody but his own players. The linesman was perfectly positioned to see that no CCFC player was in an offside position (For that matter, so was I, perfectly in line in the Main Stand), and Adebola's knock-down was finished clinically by the fomer Villa man.

Five minutes later Burton was sent off for a second yellow card offence. He had been booked for arguing about the second CCFC goal being given, then booked again for clattering Adebola. Knight then missed another blatant handball on 74 minutes, with Arber risking becoming the second Peterboro player to be sent off.

A Davenport header which looped over the Peterboro keeper and into the net, seemingly for 3-0, was disallowed, with the only central defender at Highfield Road capable of scoring a goal having been adjudged to have fouled a Peterboro player. It looked 50-50, but once again, a match official decided that football is a non-contact sport....

CCFC created chance after chance in a bid to put the match beyond doubt, with Konjic missing perhaps one of the easiest opportunites he will ever get in a CCFC shirt. But, as has been seen so often, CCFC missed, and missed again, and the opposition simply ran up the other end of the pitch and scored. Former Wimbledon man Andy Clarke finished well, but was helped by the fact no defender was anywhere near him.

The returning hero Gary McSheffrey was substituted late on, and his replacement, Courtney Pitt, gave the ball away, which led to a free kick that briefly threatened CCFC's passage into Round 4. Thankfully, Ward had other ideas, and potential embarrassment was avoided.

Barry Fry blasted the match officials for his sides second cup defeat at the hands of CCFC this season (Can we play you every week?!), though the supposedly debatable free-kick for the first goal, and the offside decision for the second, were possibly the ONLY time he called a correct decision all afternoon....