With football suffering numerous cancellations due to the latest Covid outbreak a bumper Christmas crowd of 290 turned out to see Regent face local rivals East Thurrock United, who turned up with two Regent old boys in Jake Gordon and the recently departed Jake Thompson in the starting side and Fahad Nazor on the bench.

More new faces appeared in the home line-up with Henry Day, Ollie Bell, Aaron Blair and Josh Banfield all making home debuts.

Regent played in the blue away kit in support of Shelter but East Thurrock, whose change strip is grey, had to turn out in their normal home kit of yellow to avoid a clash.

East Thurrock kicked off on a dull, damp, overcast afternoon and nothing of any great significance happened for 44 minutes. Both sides weighed each other up and the Regent supporters weighed up the new faces. Henry Day caught the eye on the left, Ollie Bell seemed to be a buccaneering central midfielder and Aaron Blair looked pacey, tenacious and looked like he could be a real handful to defences.

As the first half drew to a close there had only been a Dom Locke shot and a Luke Skinner header to brighten the day. People had drifted off to the clubhouse to beat the queue for the bar when the ball came to Jake Gordon in a central position some distance away from goal. Gordon hit an unstoppable effort first time just inside Charlie Turner’s right hand post which beat the goalkeeper in spite of a full length dive. The curse of the “ex” player playing against his former club struck on the stroke of halftime.

Second half

Regent began in the best possible way when Aaron Blair was put through to slot home an equaliser within a minute of the re-start to level things up.

The second half was as eventful as the first period had been scrappy. Regent followed up by putting a further good effort into the side netting and Jake Thompson got booked on his return for pulling Aaron Blair back. Ollie Bell took a fierce free kick which got deflected and which keeper Janata could not gather giving Zack Littlejohn an easy tap in for his second goal in two games.

Both sides went for all out attach with Thurrock forcing two last ditch clearances at one end and Janata denying the Regent forwards at the other. Both sides made substitutions in a bid to make a further breakthrough and ither gain an equaliser or put the game to bed.

In a frantic last ten minutes Regents determined defence began to give away too many free kicks in dangerous positions and too many opportunities for Thurrock to increase the pressure from their long throw specialist. Fortunately, their set piece delivery was possibly the least impressive part of their play and they did not make the best of their opportunities.

In the closing minutes as Thurrock threw everything into attack Littlejohn was booked once and then was given a second yellow for a foul which meant Regent were down to ten men.

Encouraged, Thurrock packed the Regent penalty area in added time and goalkeeper Janata came up to find a vital touch for a late equaliser. With the Thurrock goal unguarded Regent cleared the ball and put Valter Rocha in the clear near the halfway line. With their defence racing back two Thurrock defenders converged on Rocha and brought him down. The Regent support were dismayed to see Ben Wyss only receive a yellow card for the offence but almost immediately the final whistle meant that Regent got the three points their performance fully deserved.

Match Verdict

Regent were unrecognisable from the side that pre-dated manager Brett Munyard’s arrival and newcomers Bell and Blair look certain to make an impact in the rest of the season. When was the last time that Regent won three games in a row? Probably not since the 2016 promotion season?

By Paul Ketchley