Rushden & Diamonds vs Gresley Rovers
Beaten - but who cares? - Andy Parker - Burton Mail
Gresley Rovers' momentous season ended on a low note on Saturday - but none of the 200-plus South Derbyshire contingent who made the trip to Nene Park appeared to care.
Beazer League secretary Dennis Strudwick, monitoring the respective scores at Irthlingborough and Manor Park - where it transpired that Nuneaton Borough were comfortably wrapping up the championship - by mobile phone, arrived with the runners-up trophy in due time to enable the Rovers throng to celebrate promotion.
Meanwhile the home team, in keeping with their general disposition towards games against Gresley this season, trooped miserably to the dressing rooms without as much as a handclap.
For while the Northamptonshire team may have won the battle, Rovers had won the war: football in one of it's more acceptable forms had triumphed over Rushden's mixture of cynicism, bad manners and roughhouse tactics.
The shoddy Diamonds are welcome to their three points: Rovers were on the way to the Premier Division.
It was always a fair bet that Rushden would win the final game of the season for Rovers, with nothing at stake once the news that Nuneaton had taken an early lead over Evesham had arrived by that trusty mobile phone, were never disposed to mix it against a team that regards conceding free kicks as an occupational hazard.
The pitch was another factor in the general degeneration of the game, Dave Swainston's failure to control a routine through ball leading to the corner from which Glenn Beech eventually crossed from the right wing for Ollie Kearns to glance a header past Bob Aston.
Craig Weston almost sneaked an equaliser direct from one of a string of corners Rovers forced without reward before midfielder Adie Mann took time off pulling faces at the Rovers bench to cut in from the right and fire a brilliant shot into the top of the net from an acute angle. One was forced to reflect on what a good side Rushden might be if they stuck to their football.
The luckless Mike Taplin - later to head against the bar - then fired against the inside of a post after breaking clear on to Richard Denby's through ball before half time brought a reshuffle.
Denby joined fellow back injury victim Nathan Foster in the early bath and Martin Devaney arrived to set up Rovers goal with a left wing run and cross that Craig Weston had time and space to despatch into the top of the net with some panache at the far post.
Hopes of a revival were soon dashed when Diamond skipper John Flower despatched a crashing header from Beech's free kick to issue a last reminder of Rovers' dead ball vulnerability: one of the weaknesses manager Steve Dolby must now work hard to eradicate from his team in time for next season.
Rushden & Diamonds (2) 3
Gresley Rovers (0) 1
Scorers: Kearns 18, Mann 33, Flower 57 (Rushden & Diamonds); Weston 49 (Gresley Rovers).
Rushden & Diamonds: Fox, Peaks, Johnson, Flower, Beech, Page, Kirkup, Mann, Kearns, Watkins, York. Sub not used: Donegal, Waite.
Gresley Rovers: Aston, Foster (Rigg 42), Swainston, Denby (Devaney 45), Evans, Land, Wardle, Elliott, Weston, Taplin, Hurst.
Gresley man-of-the-match: Gil Land.
Referee: S W Ticknell (London).
Attendance: 647
