FOLLOWING THE SALTMEN

Tuesday 15th October 2024

Wiseman Lighting Cup

Match Report

It’s not often you can use one of football’s hackneyed old cliches and still hold your head up. This evening’s cup tie bucked that trend and with a clear conscience we can say this truly was a game of two halves.

With big games coming thick and fast and with one eye on our FA Vase game at Holbeach, the Saltmen’s starting lineup included 3 players drawn from the clubs current under 18 side. The first half saw Droitwich huff and puff but rarely create a great deal to write about. They appeared to get dragged into a long ball game against a Redditch side who were well organised defensively and strong in the air. Despite this, Spa took the lead, somewhat against the run of play when Perry Moss latched onto a neat through ball from Alex Dugmore and fired Spa-into the lead in the 13th minute. Borough’s response was quick and in the 18th minute they equalised courtesy of a goal from Brain. The rest of the first half belonged to Redditch. They created the better chances and had it not been some excellent work by Droitwich keeper Dom Rogerson and some wasteful strikes from the Redditch attack they could well have gone in at half time with the lead.

The halftime orange segments worked wonders and Droitwich immediately showed greater accuracy and creativity. Within 5 minutes of the second half starting, the Saltmen re-took the lead. Safe to say that this is not a game which Josh Murtagh in the Borough goal will remember fondly. A routine ball into the box resulted in an almost comical mixup with Liam O’Donnell with both players leaving it to the other to take control. Meanwhile, Danny Barnes was alert, noted the confusion and took full advantage.

Not satisfied with putting his side ahead, Barnes was on hand 3 minutes later to collect a superb through ball before calmly rounding the hapless Murtagh to increase the Spa advantage to 3-1. Judging by social media posts, it appears that Lewis Phillips is claiming the assist.

The goal of the game came on 65 minutes. A slick passing move which propelled Spa through the visitors’ midfield and defence ended with a cheeky Moss back heel putting in Will Dallaway who found the target with ease and claimed his first senior goal.

On 78 minutes, the inevitable happened. To their cost, a tiring Boro defence failed to note the league’s leading goal scorer Alex Dugmore lurking at the far post. The Spa man was rewarded for his lung busting running throughout the game by driving home his shot from a tight angle and increased his tally to 18 for the season!

The final goal of the game came in the 88th minute. Alex Dugmore was on the end of another through ball which left him with only Murtagh to beat. In the spirit of all good club men, Duggers selflessly squared the ball to the supporting Woody Hackett who graciously accepted the gift and rolled the ball home to make the final score 6-1 to the Saltmen.

Special mention must be made to the players who stepped seamlessly from the Under 18s and Development teams into the senior team. There are some hugely talented young players graduating from the club’s excellent youth system which can only be good for the future.

The result brought up the century of wins for Spa manager Andy Crowther from only 145 games in charge. This represents a 69% win record. Fortunately for us, the FA had already appointed some random fella with a patchy track record in English football as national team manager before they read this article! Massive congratulations to Andy and long may it continue.

Next up is our lengthy trip to Holbeach in the FA Vase. Let’s hope we can take our second half form into that game.

See you there.

Cheers

Steve