Finney bags treble in comfortable victory

LANCING Football Club recorded a comprehensive win on Saturday over an Arundel side whose boss Simon Butler said his team had “a bad day at the office”.
Action from Lancings win over Arundel on Saturday.Action from Lancings win over Arundel on Saturday.
Action from Lancings win over Arundel on Saturday.

Butler was spot on as Lancing totally dominated this game and were never in any danger of receiving anything but three points.

In all honesty, the first half was not of the highest quality as players repeatedly opted to take more touches than were necessary, which resulted in the continual breakdown of moves that could have been promising, while passes went astray on more occasions than one would care to remember.

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The first real chance of the game fell to Lancers’ Craig Knowles, who weaved his way through the visiting defence on 15 minutes but could not get his shot away.

The hosts did open the scoring on 20 minutes as Lewis Finney’s shot deflected into James Fernandes’s net after the winger had been afforded far too much time in the Mullets box before getting a shot away.

Arundel’s Barney Boutwood then forced James Shaw into his only meaningful save of the game after 27 minutes, before George Fenton headed Liam Da Costa’s effort off the line after 35 minutes which amounted to Arundel’s only serious threats on the Lancing goal in the entire game.

Lancers doubled their lead thanks to Scott Tipper’s trip on Alex Bygraves two minutes before half-time, which lacked malice but it was clumsy and Finney confidently buried the resultant penalty.

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The second half started well for the hosts as home skipper Naim Rouane played a sublime reverse pass to Finney on the left wing and he cut inside then teed up Jake Mills, who slotted the ball home with aplomb on 50 minutes.

The hosts extended their lead five minutes before the end as Rouane again played in Finney in what was a good bit of officiating with Marcus Robertshaw being offside but not interfering and Finney rounded Fernandes to complete a well-deserved hat-trick.

It was Finney’s second treble of the campaign and eighth goal of the season.

Lancing had chances to extend their advantage but were thwarted by a mixture of poor finishing and good goalkeeping.

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Lancing boss Richard Whittington said: “We showed a lot of character and heart after the midweek result but I’m really pleased with the way we played.

“I can’t praise the lads enough.”

Mullets manager Butler said: “Lancing played us off the park, to be honest, and should have won by more.”

LANCING: Shaw; Fenton, Spinks, Bygraves, Bowra; Adams, Mills, Rouane, Finney; Knowles, Callaghan. Subs: Vine (Adams 68), Robertshaw (Knowles 75), Conway (Callaghan 78), Phillips, Hendy.

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