Hartpury FC suffered a narrow 3-2 defeat in a behind-closed-doors friendly against Cardiff Met FC, on Saturday.
Ethan Vaughan made a driving run inside the opening two minutes but saw his eventual effort well blocked by a Cardiff defender.
It didn’t take long for the Acorns to break the deadlock when Archie Hearnden struck a low driven effort into the bottom corner, on four minutes.
Met tried testing their luck shortly after, but a low central driven effort was unable to beat Alex Kovacevic in the Acorns goal.
Met’s pressure eventually gave them a way back into the game a quarter of the way into the half, when a low cross was turned home from close range.
Five minutes later, Met took the lead with a rifling finish into the top corner from 12-yards.
The heat started to impact proceedings with the game slowing up after the hydration break, with both the Acorns and Met creating half chances.
Rory Preston couldn’t get on the end of a Kian Davies cross before Met saw a headed effort float wide up the other end.
But it would be Met who added a third to their tally with a glancing header from six-yards, minutes before the end.
The Acorns were given a life line moments later to get back into the game, when O’Rian Reid was brought down in the area by the Met goalkeeper.
Reid made no mistakes and made it 3-2 with an empathetically taken spot kick, to create a tense ending.
But despite late pressure from the Acorns, the equalising goal couldn’t be found seeing the Acorns fall to defeat in our opening pre-season fixture.
Written by Sam Yapp
