Dartford in a Narrow Escape from Hornets

Hopperational Details
Date & Venue	Saturday 21 September 2019 at The Camping World Community Stadium
Result	Horsham 0 Dartford 2
Competition	FA Cup Second Qualifying Round
Hopstats	Ground 704 on the lifetime list, and a non-random visit because it is the only ground on my list of top targets that is hosting a game today.
Context
Horsham are here for their fourth FA Cup tie of the season, after a big away win at Tower Hamlets, followed by a home replay win against Metropolitan Police. They play their league football in the Isthmian Premier League. Dartford are in the National League South, one tier above, and so enter the competition at this stage.
In one sentence
The result was in doubt to the very end as goals right at the end of each half ended a brave showing by the home side.
So what?
Dartford are in the draw on Monday!
Match Report
This is a tidy new ground with good facilities, a half-an-hour walk out of town but easily reached by public transport. The artificial surface allows a pass-and-move, build-from-the-back style which made an entertaining change from the usual channels and percentages that I usually see. The Hornets of Horsham started well, settling very quickly to their style, and they worked their triangles well, particularly down the right flank. Visiting keeper Mark Smith started to earn his money with two sharp reflex blocks in the first quarter of an hour. He was soon to need the help of his defenders with goal-line clearances after some penalty area pinball gave Horsham three half-chances in quick succession. As the half-hour mark approached, he then made an acrobatic one handed stop from Lea Dawson’s close range header arising from a right-side set piece. By this stage, Horsham deserved to be ahead, so the opening goal was a sickener, coming against the run of play just before half-time. Dartford’s Darren McQueen hooked a loose ball into the net. Dartford defended with more composure after the break, and although Horsham had plenty of possession, they struggled to create chances of the same clear-cut quality. Smith remained busy, and of course Dartford themselves were able to threaten on the break. Horsham’s best chance of a leveller was around the hour, but Dartford continued to cope well enough. The second goal by Luke Allen, in stoppage time, was a well-taken shot across the goal to the right hand corner, and makes the final score look more comfortable than it was. Good game for the passing neutral, and I expect to see the words brave and plucky in the other match reports. The Dartford forward with the famous dad must get fed up of being mentioned in that context, so I won’t.
Pix
Horsham in yellow and green. Match pix all taken from the shade of one of the stands. Much too hot for my pale complexion and thinning hair!    Always nice to see jobs for Marketing graduates ;)
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats
Proper statistical significance test to follow in due course! Today, Green loses to Orange, and this is a second successive clean sheet for a man in Orange, enough to cause the first change in the spectral pecking order for several months. Man-of-the-Match Mark Smith takes a breather near the end Pre-match Prediction based on Keeper Top Colour: Prediction: Home Win Was the prediction correct? No % of correct predictions so far 52% (31 from 60) Based on conventional 3pts for a win, 1pt for a draw, but also -1pt for a goal conceded (GC) and +5pts for a clean sheet (CS).  Colours ranked on a points per game (PPG) basis. The odd decimal places were caused either by half-and-half tops or sub keepers in a different colour.  The Fire Cracker colour was confirmed with the help of the social media team at Dulux UK.  All of this arises from a comment attributed to Petr Cech that orange is the best colour for a goalkeeper because it changes the behaviour of other players around the box. This table is from my last 205 games watched. P W D L GC CS Pts PPG Red 11.5 6.5 1.0 4.0 11.0 4.5 32.0 2.783 Grey 53.5 25.0 12.0 16.5 84.5 16.0 82.5 1.542 Blue 49.1 22.0 8.0 19.1 78.0 14.0 66.0 1.344 Green 112.0 55.0 12.0 45.0 196.0 25.0 106.0 0.946 Fire Cracker 3.0 1.0 0.0 2.0 6.0 1.0 2.0 0.667 Orange 62.5 23.0 13.0 26.5 106.5 13.0 40.5 0.648 Purple 22.0 8.0 5.0 9.0 45.0 6.0 14.0 0.636 Maroon 5.0 2.0 1.0 2.0 9.0 1.0 3.0 0.600 Radioactive Bile 24.0 9.0 1.0 14.0 51.0 4.0 -3.0 -0.125 Black 6.5 2.5 3.0 1.0 15.0 0.5 -2.0 -0.308 Yellow 39.0 10.0 9.0 20.0 88.0 7.0 -14.0 -0.359 Pink 20.0 6.0 5.0 9.0 42.0 1.0 -14.0 -0.700 White 1.9 0.0 0.0 1.9 4.0 0.0 -4.0 -2.105
What Next?
Follow @GrahamYapp on Twitter! My top three hopping priorities are now Tottenham Hotspur, Atherton Collieries and Radcliffe which will complete everywhere in England down to Step 3, at least until York City move into their new ground.