When we arrived, the pitch had a white sheen to it but the game was going ahead so we sheltered in the car until we saw the teams come out. Shrewton had the first chance of the match in the 8th minute when a free kick was played into the penalty area. The ball ran loose and a Shrewton player took it round the keeper only to blast it wide from an acute angle. Calne took the lead in the 19th minute from a corner which was headed past the Shrewton keeper.
Calne were dominating the midfield and Shrewton attacks kept on breaking down due to poor passing. When Calne made mistakes and allowed Shrewton to get past their midfield, the home team were unable to take advantage. The bulk of these chances were coming down the right wing but the crosses rarely found a Shrewton player.
In the 43rd minute Calne scored a second goal after being awarded a freekick on the touchline close to the penalty area. They intially tried to take a short kick early but the referee blew for a retake as they hadn't waited for his whistle. On the second attempt the ball was whipped in with pace to the back of the area.A Calne player running in towards the far post headed it back across goal for a teammate in the middle to pass the ball in to the net.
We headed back to the car to warm up but were only there for ten minutes as the referee brought the teams out early. In the 55th minute Shrewton were reduced to ten men when their captain was sent off. The ball had gone out just in front of us and Shrewton were correctly awarded a throw in. The Calne player the ball had gone off wasn't happy with the tackle that had lead to the throw in and squared up to the Shrewton player. His aggressive stance was backed up with some industrial language and it looked more like we were outside a pub at closing time rather than at a football match. The Shrewton captain tried to push the Calne player back and this was interpreted by the referee as violent conduct. To be fair he wouldn't have heard or seen the cause of the raised hands and decided to issue a yellow to the Calne player, followed to our surprise by a red for the Shrewton player. We were expecting both players to get the same punishment.
Calne made the most of their man advantage and had a shot just wide from the left in the 65th minute. In the 76th minute they scored again following a cross from the right. A Calne player almost tipped himself into a somersault while stretching to head the ball down to a team mate who had an easy tap in from close range. Both teams were finding it difficult to control the ball and many first touches were poor. The game became quite scrappy towards the end and despite late chances at both ends, the match finished as a 3.0 win for the visitors.
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