The romance of the cup is something special in this country and it is no different in Cornwall, whilst the big guns clashed in the FA Cup, Threemilestone Reserves traveled to Troon in the Jolly's Shield. Could the cup bring TMS some relief from the disappointment of their league form?

Threemilestone started the stronger of the two sides putting pressure on the home sides' goal from the outset. Chances went begging before Jolly managed to lift the ball over the home side's keeper even though he had miscontrolled the through ball. The goal seemed to spark Troon into action and they began to put some serious pressure on the Stones defence, attack after attack followed and it was evident from the side lines that it was only a matter of time before the away sides defences would be breeched, and before this observation was out of your mind the Troon left winger had managed to sneak past the TMS right back and slotted the ball past the TMS keeper with the pace of an asthmatic ant with some very heavy shopping. One - one, would this see the walls come tumbling down? Fortunately not, their defence held out just, although Steve Pascoe nearly snatched the lead for the visitors on the stroke of half time when his five yard snap shot whistled past the right hand upright.

Half time saw the teams locked at one - one.

Now I always thought that the half time break was between ten to fifteen minutes depending on the league you played in, the premiership for instance is fifteen minutes, due to the fact that it takes 5 minutes for the player's hairdryers to warm up. It seems though that the reserves have decided that a break of between twenty and twenty five minutes is far better and less taxing than the normal time period, this can be the only explanation that from one - one at half time they found themselves four one down after fifty five minutes. It has to be said that the teams' defending was like the Maginot Line, looks menacing on paper, but in practical terms you just have to go around it to breech it. Dave "Gaffer" Hill made changes bringing himself on and Richard "Jabbathehutt, but I play like Beckham, Victoria that is" Luff to try and repair some of the damage. It seemed to work for several seconds when Jolly latched onto some "keystone cops" defending by the home side to reduce the deficit to two. Two behind and still twenty five minutes on the clock, plenty of time to get those two important goals, and right on cue Troon did, with both goals coming from corners within minutes of each other and one scored by a three foot pigmy who managed to sneak on a step ladder, set it up in the middle of the TMS goal area without a single defender noticing there was anything out of the ordinary, before climbing it and heading into the net above the six foot plus defenders. Credit must be given when credit is due, the reserves did not give up, in fact they remembered that they had traveled to Troon to play football and that is what they did, by pinning the home side back into their half for the remaining twenty minutes of the match. During this period Elliot "yes I do look like Ray Parlour "Jolly completed his hat-trick, after a penetrating run by Daz "I didn't give a penalty away this week" Woolcock saw him drill a cross low into the box for Jolly to finish. " Parlour" then brought two fine saves from the Troon keeper before Steve Pascoe hit the back of the net again, with another assist going to Woolcock, it was just a shame that at that point the referee blew the final whistle, another twenty minutes and the Stones could have been celebrating a victory. (If only they hadn't had that twenty minute half time break eh!).

Richard Luff, Manager