Hall hat-trick boosts Mattishall

Mattishall 4, Stalham 0

MATTISHALL welcomed midtable Stalham looking to maintain their im-pressive home record.

Mattishall had much the better of the early exchanges and after 15 minutes took the lead when Hall burst through on the right and from a very acute angle smashed the ball into the net.

Mattishall continued to have the majority of the possession and Hall's pace on the right was causing the visitors problems. From another of his surging runs Hall squeezed the ball over the line for his second.

The visitors' Bell nearly brought his side back into the game. A free-kick eluded everybody but took a high bounce and went over the bar. Normal service was resumed at the other end. Following a Clarke corner the ball struck the inside of the post but rebounded into play and was cleared.

Mattishall continued to press, were looking for the third goal but it stayed 2-0 at the interval.

The second half started as a midfield battle. On the hour Harbour came in on the left in place of Wooden and Clarke took up a more central position. Following some quick thinking from Winter at a free-kick, he fed Hall on the right wing and his excellent cross found the Mattishall forwards queuing up and Clarke forced the ball home.

When Stalham did force an opening, a lob over the keeper bounced over an unguarded net. Clarke forced an excellent save from Nicholls when clean through then Hall completed his hat-trick when he skilfully lobbed the ball over the advancing keeper.

This was a very committed performance and together with the goals, keeping a clean sheet with the centre back pairing of King and Lovell looking very solid, Mattishall continue to chase a top-two finish in Anglian Combination Division One.

Mattishall Reserves eased their relegation fears with a 5-1 victory over Wells Reserves, scorers Jason Knights (2), Christian Harbour, Duncan Hewitt and Alex Kovia.