One win from the last three games would likely be enough to get the Men’s 1s the league title, but nerves were still jangling from the dropped points the week before against Ashford. Perennial rivals Gore Court wouldn’t have been the opposition you’d have chosen for such a key game either, given that we knew they’d be keen to spoil the party.

However, any pre-match jitters were quickly put to bed as FOHC showed clear intent early on to dominate possession, moving the ball around nicely. After a couple of early probing efforts, Tom Bean picked the ball up in midfield, played a 1-2 to work himself deep into the D, and finished calmly over the keeper. Shortly after a second goal followed after another 1-2 up front between Little and the forwards resulted in Bean having a tap in to an open goal.

At the back, the rearguard of Tomlinson, Bell and Herd looked unthreatened, Payne and Mainwaring were recycling possession well, and Tolhurst, Ithurrdale and Bondzio were finding a lot of space up the flanks to start attacks.

We reached halftime 2-0 up, with the only blot on the copy book that we hadn’t scored any of a number of penalty corners, the result of Gore Court employing some sort of Jedi on the far post.

Immediately after halftime Gore Court went down to 10 men after a hefty challenge on Garrett Llewellyn was rewarded with a yellow card, and we took advantage with a goal by captain Josh Clifford after a lovely passing move. Gore Court didn’t take this lying down though and came back into the game strongly, pulling a goal back after the Folkestone defence didn’t clear its lines. Sniffing a chance for an upset, Gore Court employed a full press and for a moment Folkestone looked rattled, finding it difficult to get the ball out of our half, and pressing keeper Gaz Whitham into service at last.

With the higher press though came more space in behind the Gore Court defence, and the deciding goal came when another passing move left schoolboy Isaac Hopkin alone with time to finish on the far post to make it 4-1 Folkestone, and Gore Court’s resilience was finally broken. From that point it became one-way traffic as Clifford and Will Mead also got on the scoresheet, making the final score 6-1 and only kept down by some exceptional saves by the Gore Court keeper.

After the final whistle, news filtered through that Eastbourne had drawn against Blackheath, making the 1s champions and leading to some joyous celebrations that likely contributed to this match report being even less detailed and accurate than usual. The 1s now wrap up their season with games to come against relegated Cliftonville and third-placed Blackheath.