Hampstead away, Prem - 6 Oct 2012

Purley started the 2012/13 season with a difficult away fixture against Hampstead, last year's champions. Due to early season availability problems, Purley were only able to field ten players - but, the team was excited and ready to get the new year underway.

The team started strongly with Mike Barrett winning the first face-off. This was as far ahead as the team were going to get. Despite some strong goalkeeping from Paul Terry, Hampstead opened the scoring and went several goals ahead. Purley fought back and scored themselves before the end of the first quarter, going into the break at 3-1 down.

The second quarter was a tour de force by Purley. The team played some exceptional team defence and held the ball well in attack. The exact score has been lost to the mists of time, but the team went into the half time break with smiles on faces and heads held high. Early on in the second half Purley managed to claw the difference back to one goal - for the best part of a minute. At this point Hampstead's substitutes began to tell. The dastardly opposition pulled a sneaky trick in trying to exploit the tiring legs of the Purley Lions by pressuring the ball and moving quickly on the break. How dare they.

Hampstead pulled slightly further away in the last quarter and the game finished 11-6. Purley fought hard and can be proud of the score, under difficult circumstances the team did incredibly well and played some great lacrosse. It the same level of performance and desire is kept up the South Premiership should pose no problems. Special mention goes to Jay and Sam Baranowski - these two young players made their debuts for the club and did exceptionally well. For two players with such little experience to hold their own against a team of ex-college players speaks volumes about their potential (#onestowatch). Also, congratulations to Guy Francis for scoring on his return to lacrosse.