Pre Season Friendly
at Birch Park, Ontario Road, Bottesford
Bottesford Town (0) 1
Tom Johnson 59
Scunthorpe United (1) 3
Sam Winnall 5
Paddy Madden 49, 89
Admission £6. Programme £1
Attendance 520
Left click pictures to enlarge
Herrick, Spall, Bryant, Johnson, Ridley, Barwick, Start, MacDonald, Snowden, Pembleton, Cross.
Subs - Beedle, Boulton, Gibbons, Harle, Coulbeck, Thompson, Kirk, Quickenden, Stones.
1st half: Slocombe, Nolan, Canavan, Boyce, Williams, Myrie-Williams, Bishop, Sparrow, McSheffrey, Winnall, Burton.
2nd half half: Severn, Hornsey, Waterfall, Howe, Dawson, Bateson, McAllister, Syers, Adelakun, Madden, Taylor.
Subs - Hare, Wootton.
The Poachers are a community based club and encouraging the local kids is obviously the way forward ... catch 'em while they're young.
A decent sized crowd turned out for the visit of League One neighbours 'Scunny', but I never actually heard the official attendance being announced.
In recent seasons I've heard tell that teams of the 'calibre' of the Iron and 'Donny' Rovers have been asking host clubs for up to 50% of the gate from pre season games ... in that case I don't blame them for keeping schtum about how many people were there and will happily delete the previous sentence and airbrush the spectators off of the accompanying pictures, if Bottesford want to claim was played behind closed doors.
Subsequently, the home side have declared that the official turnout was 520; but the offer of subterfuge, cooking the books and doctoring the figures still stands, if required.
Bottesford keeper Leigh Herrick (sponsored by THE66POW) had a busy night, but he came through with flying colours and easily beat team mate Tom Johnson into second place in the the man of the match contest, by virtue of pulling off a string of saves against his former club.
Though Herrick had a busy night; from a completely unbiased perspective, I thought that the 3-1 margin actually flattered 'Scunny' a bit and the late goal gave the final result a slightly lop-sided appearance.
Sure, the Iron had done enough to claim a win, of sorts, but Bottesford ran them close and weren't overwhelmed by their Football League opponents, once they had found their feet following a few near misses and scrapes during the opening exchanges.
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| "****ing 'ave it!" |
On five minutes it looked a bit ominous for the home side when Matt Sparrow slipped a ball through their defence for Sam Winnall to run onto a score from 12 yards out, despite the best efforts of the 'veteran' keeper advancing from his line to block the angle.
Myrie-Williams was presenting Bottesford with all manner of options down the right flank, but the home side's defence were well organised and soaked up the pressure well.
Former Jamaican international Deon Burton was looking far too lively and spritely for a 37 year old, but he hadn't packed his shooting boots tonight and Bottesford were marshalling him well.
Myrie-Williams went down on the edge of the box under a nothing challenge from Lee Ridley and the referee waved away a few half hearted appeals for a spot kick.
Having absorbed a frenzied start from the visitors, Bottesford started to build up a head of steam themselves and began to make some in roads into Scunthorpe's final third.
With players like Terry Barwick and Robbie Start in their side, the Poachers are never likely to be pushovers, but they were looking impressive as they set about looking for an equaliser. But as you'd expect, the Iron were tight at the back and though the home side created a few half chances, the nearest they came to scoring was from a Jack Cross ree kick.
However, having started the game on the back foot, Bottesford had stood form, for the most part against Russ Wilcox's side and finished the first half well.
HT - Bottesford Town 0 v Scunthorpe United 1
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| Storm clouds on the horizon as the second half 'Scunny' line up warm up, while their first half team have a debriefing |
Danny Boulton and Danny Gibbons impressed for the home side after the restart, but Scunthorpe repeated their first half party piece and sooned bagged another goal inside the opening minutes of the second period.
Curtis Bateson teed the ball up for Sean McAllister who powered a shot from 18 yards that Herrick got down well to, palming the ball around the post at full stretch at the expense of a corner.
Andy Dawson's flag kick picked out Dave Syers, whose thumping goalbound header was well saved by the defiant Herrick, but Paddy Madden was on hand to pick up the loose ball and he netted from close range.
Bottesford's heads didn't drop having conceded the second goal and they dusted themselves down and set about getting back into the game. Their deserved breakthrough came with 30 minutes remaining, when Tom Johnson capped off a great display by our jumping his former clubs defence and halving the deficit from six yards out.
Jake Taylor and Luke Waterfall both got no change out of Herrick as Bottesford continued to pick up the pace at the other end.
James Severn was at full stretch when he turned Boulton's shot away at the foot of his right hand post to deny the hosts an equaliser and shortly afterwards Chris MacDonald was denied by the linesman's flag when he thought he has levelled things up.
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| Gooooalll!!! |
Herrick was taken off for a well deserved rest in the closing stages and Zach Beedle took over in goal for the Poachers.
It could be argued that Herrick would've dealt with the corner from Hakeeb Adelakun, in the final minute, that evaded Beedle and gave Madden the simplest of chances to score Scunthorpe's third and final goal, but these friendly games are not just about established players like Leigh Herrick putting in accomplished and crowd pleasing performances, they also offer the opportunity for younger players to pick up some valuable experience against top class players ... and Beedle will certainly have learned a lot from that moment in the glare of the spotlight and won't allow himself to get boxed in by a crafty professional opponent at a corner kick again..
No harm done though, it's only pre-season, not a league game, with points at stake.
Full Time - Bottesford Town 1 v Scunthorpe United 3
