Waltham Forest turned in a memorable defensive performance to take three points from promotion-chasing
FC Romania.
Turgut Esendagli elected to play five at the back - as he had done in last season's victory over
Romania - and welcomed Jon Jon Sexton back to the first team.
The back five of Ibs
Sari, Sexton, Kubilay Akbayrak,
Elie Mbangu and
Miguel Lopes De Matos dealt with everything thrown at them, despite spending most of the 90 minutes on the back foot. The few times the visitors did get through,
William Hunt was there in the
Forest goal to pick up the loose balls.
It could have all been so different though. Romania took the lead after
19 minutes, Pop rounding off a nice passing move. At this stage, it looked like there would be only one winner as the visitors dominated proceedings.
However, Forest didn't lie down. A good passing move almost saw
Alan Callaghan through on goal, but
Stephen Ellery - making his return to Forest a spell at Wadham
Lodge - just overhit his pass.
This overhit pass saw the Romania defender try to shepherd the ball out, slip, and allow Callaghan to roll the ball to
Solomon Ofori who made no mistake.
At some points in the second half Romania were playing with five up front and one at the back. It was therefore no surprise when Forest hit them on the break.
Just two minutes into the second half, a misplaced backwards header allowed Callaghan to sneak in unnoticed and lob the stranded keeper.
Jose Agua who had a relatively quiet game was taken down in the box midway through the second half when Forest had a two on one situation but the referee waved away his cries for a penalty.
But Agua made amends moments later, latching on to a long ball over the top from Mbangu and smashing the ball home
.
In the remaining quarter of an hour Romania threw everything they had at Forest but the Forest back five limited the away side to a series of wayward long-distance efforts.
Forest travel to
Clapton next Sunday, who squandered a three goal lead in a
4-3 defeat to
Stansted.
- published: 06 Dec 2015
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