Tividale vs Gresley Rovers
Mudbath! – Andy Parker – Burton Mail
If the world heavyweight title was decided in the sort of conditions that Gresley Rovers encountered at Tividale on Saturday, Frank Bruno would probably stand a chance of beating Iron Mike Tyson.
As it was, bottom-of-the-Banks’s League ‘Dale, while never threatening to deliver a knockout punch to top-of-the-league Gresley, at least had Rovers on the ropes for a brief, uncomfortable period on a muddy maelstrom of a Black Country afternoon.
That referee Ashley allowed the game to be played in such a quagmire was questionable; that the Banks’s League ordered it start at 3pm was utterly ridiculous.
Without the benefit of floodlights, Gresley and their hosts were dancing in the dark long before the end of this watery encounter.
Fortunately, Rovers had done enough in the earlier rounds of the bout to pick up three hugely useful points. First Mick Guest kept his feet in the mud to convert the rebound from six yards after Trace Norton had bashed a 21st minute shot against the left hand post, then Steve Astley, instigator of the first goal, showed equal poise to score the second when put clean through by Richard Denby’s superb crossfield pass six minutes later.
Said manager Frank Northwood afterwards: “We were superb in the first half but then the pitch levelled it and a mistake let them back into it. But we were delighted that the referee allowed us to complete the game and pick up the points.”
It was more a series of mud-prompted errors that gave Tividale their 72nd minute morale booster. First Astley and Ray Skeemer contrived to get in each other’s way in the centre circle with the ball squirting and spurting between them, then Gil Land failed to complete a clearance on the left of the box and Roy Lyness crossed for Gary Nettleford to nick the ball home.
That meant an anxious finale for Gresley although Smith and Astley both had chances to put the issue beyond doubt.
Tividale (0) 1
Gresley Rovers (2) 2
Scorers: Nettleford 72 (Tividale); Guest 21, Astley 27 (Gresley Rovers).
Tividale: Bate, Delahay, Bradley, Sharpe, Kettle, Beckford, Hampton, Lyness, Nettleford, Malcolm, Dunkley. Subs not used: Edwards, Knowles.
Gresley Rovers: Aston, Bottomley (Nicklin 84), Perry, Denby, Land, Skeemer, Guest, Norton, Acklam (Lovell 67), Smith, Astley.
Gresley man-of-the-match: Richard Denby
Referee: A E Ashley (Nuneaton).
Attendance: 80
