Sunday 23 October

Market Rd, k.o. 4 p.m.

Team: Linter; Keen, Vere, Gromb, Mandolini; Milner, Hyde, Seaton-Smith, J Perez-Tejedor; Gamson, Stevens.

Sub: King (on for Stevens, 2)

Scorers: Seaton-Smith, Hyde.

The Jokers took a break from their league programme with a friendly against Division 1 side Hoxton Casuals. As the Casuals had avoided the drop by only a single point last season, sending the Jokers down instead, this promised to be a close match. The team was missing a clutch of quality players: Last week's double scorer Roberts, top scorer Wilby, the versatile Read and left-back Lynes. Nevertheless, they fielded what is arguably their strongest midfield in front of a reshuffled defence that saw Gromb return to centre-back, Keen switch from the right to the left and Mandolini playing for the first time at right-back. Gamson got a rare chance to start up front and was partnered intially by Stevens, who left the action after only a couple of minutes with a calf injury, to be replaced by King.

Half past four and the game looked like is was going to be anything but close as a series of defensive errors saw Hoxton race into a three-goal lead. Firstly, Vere missed a relatively simple clearance to allow a striker to square for one of Hoxton's two number eights to find the target. Then a similar mix-up saw the same combination double their lead. Finally, a Mandolini foul on the edge of the box allowed Hoxton to fire in a free kick across the six-yard box that went into the far corner untouched (the second the Jokers have conceded in this manner this season).

3-0 was harsh on the Jokers, who had managed to string together the occasional good move and had worked one or two chances of their own, but the difference in class between the two divisions was evident; in recent weeks the Jokers would not have been punished for these mistakes - today they were. Hope came in the form of a Seaton-Smith free-kick following a foul on Hyde at the corner of the box. Seaton-Smith powered a drive into the top corner to reduce the arrears and ensure that the Jokers got to the break 3-1 down.

It was a rejuvenated Jokers that took to the field for the second half, determined to cut out the mistakes and to start competing. But the immediate omens were not good. Gamson and King put a lot of thought into the kick-off, with several players given nods and winks to alert them to what was planned. What was not planned however, was King's Robert Pires-like decision to play the ball to himself. With the Jokers waiting for the referee to adjudicate, the Casuals raced off down their left and fired a cross-shot into the side netting.

This was to be a rare Hoxton threat. Other than a cross-shot that drifted past the far post (following a clear foul on Gromb), a back-header that had Linter intially scrambling, and a superb block at the far post by Gromb (from which the ref inexplicably awarded a goal kick) the Jokers looked untroubled and proceeded to create chances of their own. They pulled the score back to 3-2 when a Milner corner was headed powerfully into the net by Hyde. For the rest of the match, it was the Jokers who looked more likely to score: Gamson hit the angle of post and bar with a clipped shot and put a difficult chance from close range over the top from a Hyde cross. Seaton-Smith unlocked the Hoxton defence with a straight ball between the centre backs that Hyde ran onto, his prodded shot beating the keeper, but going just wide. Gamson fired narrowly wide following a slip from a Hoxton defender. In a match that the Jokers looked completely out of after thirty minutes, they can count themselves unlucky that they did not leave the field with a draw.