IAS 5-Aside Football Tournament – Did NovaLoca defend the plate?
The Powerleague Ground in the shadow of Wembley Stadium once again played host to the IAS 5-aside football tournament this June.
After winning the tournament’s equivalent of the Europa League in 2013, the NovaLoca squad took a train down to London with the goal of bettering last year’s honours.
Optimistically, NovaLoca were the first team to arrive in Wembley and got in some much needed training in preparation for the first game of the competition. 12 teams arrived to take part and eagerly awaited the draw for the first round group stage. NovaLoca were drawn against last year’s winners CBRE, Vail Williams and Gerald Eve.
Proceedings got off to a bright start as the NovaLoca team picked up a hard fought 3-2 victory over CBRE. However, it was all downhill from there. The game with Vail Williams finished 6-3 to the opposition, including a penalty cheaply given away (unfortunately by this writer) and easily converted by Vail Williams. The final group game was against group leaders Gerald Eve, with NovaLoca needing a win to qualify. Ultimately we were edged out in a close 2-1 defeat, leaving us bottom of the pile and out of a chance of winning the big prize.
Finishing bottom of the group did give us a chance to retain the plate that came home with NovaLoca last year. However, our semi-final match against Kier ended with another close defeat, this time 4-3, despite mounting a late comeback.
NovaLoca goalkeeper Martin was arguably one of the stars of the tournament, doing his best David Seaman impression to deny a number of chances.
Once the disappointment of our early exit had died down, it was on to enjoying the barbecue and having a few drinks in the shadow of Wembley stadium. All in all a great event, but a shame not to come away with at least the wooden spoon again!
