The London Olympians vs Essex Spartans (photo-gallery)
[Olympians 32 - Spartans 6]

The day was draped in glorious hot sunshine and most likely impacted on the game being one of great sportsmanship. Despite being out-gunned for strength by a well-sized Essex line on both sides of the ball it was the execution of the Olympians that prevailed. Essex halted the first drive of the Olympians and forced them to punt, which placed them deep in their own half. Not perturbed by bad field positioning Essex kept the ball on the ground and marched to the Olympians 20 yard area but the drive was halted there. On the turnover of the ball the Olympians combined short passes to their promising receiving corps and rushing by rookie running back Toyin Dawudu to score a TD on a 15 yard run. Kicker Carl James successfully converted the PAT for a lead score of 7-0. On the ensuing kick-off, Essex fumbled the ball for the Olympians to recover but the Essex defense held firm to prevent another score and this saw out the end of the 1st quarter.

The 2nd quarter was again rewarding for the Olympians in mixing up the short passing and rushing as running back Adrian John ran 25 yards, led by some pretty sound blocking, to score the team's second TD of the day and the PAT made the score 14-0. The visitors kept plugging away but on the first play after very good kick-off return the ball was fumbled to the Olympians who returned it from midfield to the 3 yard line of Essex, courtesy of running back Seun Shobande. The next play resulted in a TD after QB Neale Canning scrambled into the end zone but no PAT conversion was made - 20-0. From this point Essex managed to drive the ball downfield into Olympians territory but lacked the final push into a scoring position before stalling to sound Olympian defence. Olympians promising receiver Chris Davies (who doubles up as a kicker) took a reception for 20 yards to the Essex 2 yard line and QB Canning found consistently scoring receiver Daniel Jeanton in the endzone for his 6th consecutive game score leaving the score at 26-0 as the PAT resulted in a bad snap that got smothered by the hungry Essex defense.

As the half wore down it seemed that all was over and a shutout was on the cards but Essex were still fighting hard and halted the scoring by the Olympians. Essex got their tempo up and kept the Olympians DBs busy which drew them a couple of penalties. Now with good field position they literally hit the ground running and scored their first TD of the game, courtesy of RB/DE Shulba Hunt, as time expired but could not convert their PAT.

A sack from linebacker Wajid Latiff early in the 3rd quarter on the Essex QB set the tempo for the dominance the Olympians were now enjoying. DBs Ashton Campbell, Justin Holder, Mark Finney, Tosin Dawudu and Leslie Oluwale-Wilson kept breaking up the deep passes that Essex are renown for scoring with and as such kept them to a few short completions. After a fumble recovery in the Essex red zone Adrian John obliged with a rushing TD after fullback Alwyn Davis ran for 25 yards on a dive to the visitors' 12 yard line.

The next Olympians drive was halted and at midfield Essex took over and set about passing but an interception deep in Olympians half saw an awesome "you-got-to-see-the-tape" return for 68 yards from Leslie Oluwale-Wilson. In return however Essex pulled off their second game interception soon after and returned it to just inside Olympians territory. The drive was short-lived when Olympians DB Paul Barquinha sacked their QB and forced a turnover wherein the next possession by the Olympians controlled proceedings to end the game at 32-6 to the Olympians.

MVP awards for the game were -

Team MVP: Neale Canning,
Offense MVP: Carl James,
Defense MVP: Paul Barquinha
Special teams MVP: Chris Davies

The next game is at our temporary home on June 21 at Warren Avenue Playing Fields, Warren Avenue, Downham, Bromley, Kent BR1 4BP against Maidstone Pumas, kick-off is at 2:30pm.