The boys started the game on the front foot as Carter Culp picked out the run of Yannis Boudiab inside the opening minute. Boudiab looked to beat the keeper, who was miles off his line, but pulled his strike wide of the mark to hand the visitors an early reprieve.

From the resulting goal-kick, Newcastle opened the scoring as they capitalised on a defensive error to penetrate our back line. The striker kept his cool to round Drake Heredia and squeeze it home to leave us chasing the game after just two minutes played.

Having fallen behind so quickly, it would have been easy for heads to drop, but that couldn’t have been any further from what happened. Devs and Daz would have been proud of the reaction from the lads, as they went back on the attack to try and level it back up.

As it happens, they didn’t have to wait too long to level the scores as Tobi Rufai nodded home in the ninth minute. Giacomo Brosco delivered a peach of a corner kick from the right side, and Tobi rose highest of anyone to power his header down and beyond the keeper to tie us up.

For all of our good play in attack, we were struggling to contain our visitors when they broke. Newcastle restored their lead just four minutes after Tobi’s goal, leaving us chasing the game once again.

We kept on pushing at the top end and almost drew level when Boudiab beat the full-back down the left and fired at goal from a narrow angle, but the keeper was equal to it. Minutes later, Josh Warukira had a half chance as he found himself with room to shoot at the edge of the area, but he pulled it wide.

Football can be a cruel game sometimes, and that is exactly how the boys would have been feeling when Newcastle added a third goal before the half hour mark. We’d seen most of the ball and had the better chances, yet found ourselves two goals behind. Those are the fine margins in football, though. We simply had to take our chances, and tighten up at the back.

Despite the growing deficit, the boys kept on fighting and stepped up their game another level after Newcastle’s third. Boudiab nearly scored what would have been a goal of the season contender as he spun his marker with a lovely bit of skill, but then fired his effort right at the keeper.

Then, Nathan Andreotti hit a much needed breakthrough as he finished from close range to halve our deficit. Rufai broke down the left and fired an effort at the keeper. The goalie stopped it, but spilled it. Boudiab was the first to react and rather than try to score, opted instead to cleverly poke it to the left for Andreotti to smash home into an empty net to reduce the arrears to one.

The chances continued to come thick and fast Karel Van Doorn smashed a free-kick at goal from the edge of the area, but was denied by a decent save. Tobi Rufai had another chance from a corner kick but this time headed over. From the resulting goal kick, we won the ball back at the edge of their box and it fell for Boudiab, and once again the keeper denied him with a fine save.

Boudiab had been a thorn in the side of Newcastle all morning and created another opening in the final minute of the half when he scooped the ball through for Andreotti. The striker opted to volley first time, leaving the keeper to breathe a sigh of relief as it sailed over the bar. 3-2 it remained at the interval.

Into the second half, we kept on where we left off in the first half as Greens kept piling on the pressure in the early May sunshine at Coach Lane. Nenad Visnjic entered the fray for the final half hour, and almost got himself on the scoresheet when Karel fed him, but he fired his strike right into the stomach of a grateful Newcastle stopper.

Boudiab came inches away from a worldie once again in the 67th minute. We won a free-kick on the left side of the area, and the midfielder opted to try and pick out the far corner but whipped his audacious, powerful strike just beyond the far post.

Eventually, after what felt like an age of pushing for it, we got our leveller as Andreotti fed a through ball into the path of Van Doorn. The defender got there before Karel and looked to play it back to his keeper, but he underhit the pass and allowed Karel to race onto it and smash it past the keeper to bring us back on to an equal footing.

We kept on going in search of a winner, but it just wasn’t to be in this one. Nevertheless, the lads showed great spirit, fight and character to fight back not once, but twice. That just about summed up Devs and Daz’s boys this season as their maiden campaign comes to a thrilling close at Coach Lane. That’s all she wrote for the NFYL for this season for Green, and we can’t wait to see what they can achieve next term.

POTM: Karel Van Doorn