fisher190205

Fish battered

ERITH and Belvedere were outstanding on Saturday as they soundly beat table-topping Fisher Athletic, dubbed as the “Chelsea of the Southern League”.

The “Fish” dominated the opening quarter of an hour, their movement and passing were top notch but the Deres defence coped well and along with a robust midfield, the Deres kept out the promotion chasing side. Glen Knight was on top form between the sticks as he made numerous crucial saves.

An ageing Fisher back line clearly struggled with the long balls being fed into the Deres potent and youthful strike force of Ian Pulman and Chris Dickson. Their pace was clearly causing the Fisher back line a lot of problems. Many balls were floated into the front pair and the “route one” football was definitely working for the home side.

The Deres were soon to be rewarded for their hard work in defence when the ball was guided into Pulman who took advantage of a slip by Steve Aris as he zoomed passed him before unleashing a wicked shot from 20 yards out, which Jerome John could do nothing to stop. The home fans, who had had little to cheer about this season, went ballistic.

The remainder of the first period was fairly tense, but the Deres held out for the rest of the half and slightly against the run of play, the Deres went in 1-0 up at the interval.

Fisher forayed for an equaliser, but the defence held out excellently and most certainly won the Aerial battles. This pattern continued, with the Deres sole objective to stop the ball from nestling in the back of their net.

But a wild hoof clear met the dazzling feet of Chris Dickson who tricked his way to a one-on-one with Goalkeeper John, before walking round him and sliding the ball into the empty net to provoke jubilant scenes at Park View Road. The Deres were 2-0 against Fisher Athletic, a scoreline which bookmakers would have given you good odds on before kick off.

As Fisher got more and more frustrated, their captain Chris Piper was sent off for a second bookable offence just two minutes after Dickson’s goal.

As Fisher searched in desperation for a goal, the Deres took advantage of the Fish’s lacklustre defence as Chris Dickson’s head met a Scott Hall cross and the Deres were 3-0 up against the Fish.

A few home fans joked “it’ll end up 3-3”, but unlike the Chatham Town game earlier on in the season, time was not on the Fish’s hands, and instead of the better side on paper attacking, it turned out to be the Deres who were searching for an unprecedented fourth goal.

With just six minutes remaining, the ball was lobbed into the path of Chris Dickson who unfortunately failed to get a dream hat trick, as Jermiane John did excellently well to stop the youngster from getting his 15^th league goal of the season.

The game ended 3-0 to the Deres, and now the Welling based side are out of the relegation zone in the Southern League Division One East.