Sylvans 1, Belgraves 1

MYSTERY still surrounds the future of Sylvans’ coach Martyn de Garis, who refused to say whether is he stepping down or not after he watched his side earn a well-deserved draw with Bels at St Peter’s. Word had come out of the westerners last week that their popular Priaulx boss was going to resign after Saturday’s game.

He is reportedly unhappy about a number of issues, including a lack of commitment from his players and lack of support from his committee. Yet after their top-of-the-table clash with Bels, he declined to comment on whether he was throwing it all in, as did the club president, Peter Roberts.

It is unclear what the present situation is, but it is understood that de Garis is having showdown talks with the Sylvans hierarchy tonight and if the issues are not resolved, he will walk away later in the week.

However, de Garis was happy to talk about his side’s performance on the pitch.

They took the lead through their captain, Matt Warren, midway through the second half, only for Scott Bradford to equalise just a couple of minutes before the end.

‘It was a good game with the side we had out,’ said de Garis.

‘The young lads did well and I thought the whole team did well.’

There was nearly a nightmare start for de Garis and his team when just 10 minutes in, young centre back Tom Strawbridge was dispossessed by Marc McGrath on the edge of the area, but the livewire striker’s curling shot flew just wide.

The Bels man was a handful all match and looked the best player on the pitch.

A little while later he was released by a probing through ball from Matt Drillot and beat the outrushing Sylvans keeper Paul de Garis, but his shot was the wrong side of the far post.

Drillot was in the thick of it all game in the middle of the park and there was certainly no love lost between the former Sylvans man and Warren.

Bels enjoyed the run of play during the opening 45 minutes and their next good chance came just before half-time when Bradford rose in the box at a set piece, but his header skimmed the bar and went behind for a goal kick.

Most of Sylvans’ attacks came down their right flank through their fullback, Ben Duff, but with their Venezuelan magician, Eduardo Santana, having a quiet game up front, Bels keeper Rhys Gower was hardly tested.

But on the hour mark Warren unleashed a stinging low strike from outside the area that took a little deflection off Santana to beat Gower at his near post.

But the goal did not take the wind out of the visitors’ sails and shortly afterwards Bradford had another header that went begging.

Joby Bourgaize also went close and, with the clock ticking down, Bradford found the bottom corner of the goal to see that the points were shared.

‘I’m disappointed that we’ve come away with just a point,’ said Ogier.

‘We had so much possession and they had only one chance. It was bad marking and Rhys should have saved it.

‘What I am happy about was the way we battled when we were 1-0 down and we took the game to them. It shows that we’ve got the fight that we had two years ago.’