East Midlands Counties League
The Riverside Park, Barrow on Soar
Saturday, 21st November 2009, 3.00pm
Easy Win For Gresley
Gresley should have left Barrow winning by a much larger margin than they did as they controlled the game for large periods in wet and blustery conditions.
Some fine saves from former Moatman Tom Allan and the woodwork prevented the home side from being well and truly beaten.
All Gresley's goals came in the first half through Mickey Lyons and Royce Turville with substitute Ash Wignall scoring for the home side in the second half.
Gresley showed their intent with a blistering shot from Brian Woodall on five minutes flying just wide.
However, five minutes later the visitors got the goal their early play deserved. Mickey Lyons found himself with space down the right and his cross-cum-shot caught Allan out as the ball flew over his head and into the top corner of the net.
Gresley pressed looking for more goals with Allan doing really well to hold a powerful header from Martin Gadsby.
One of Barrow's two attempts on goal in the first half came on 22 minutes but Stu Wilson planted his header from Lee Dawson's free kick well wide.
On 22 minutes Gresley pressure told as they added their second goal. A long cross field pass picked out Woodall who then sent over an inviting cross that Turville accepted putting his free header past Allan.
Unfortunately the two goal lead seemed to signal the Barrow players to some very dubious tackling that the referee at first ignored much to the anger of the Gresley bench and supporters.
The visitors were having to avoid some crude tackles but managed to keep their composure and continued to take charge of the game.
On 36 minutes Carl Slater's persistence led to him firing a goal bound shot that took a deflection on its way. And, from the resultant corner Lyons swung in the ball and Turville's header needed to be cleared off the line by a defender.
Slater went close again firing over the bar but with five minutes remaining Gresley did increase their advantage. A ball held up in the wind was flicked on by Gadsby into the path of Turville who strode forward and easily slotted the ball past Allan.
A minute later Barrow were very fortunate to still have eleven men on the pitch. Turville once more found himself in on goal but was brought down by defender Richard Foster who amazingly only received a yellow card for denying the Gresley man a goal scoring opportunity.
The second half Gresley faced the blustery wind and rain but continued where they'd left off in the first.
Barrow were getting frustrated and resorted to making some tackles that led to a rush of yellow cards from referee Mr Tinsley who should really have stamped his authority earlier in the game.
One of the yellows was shown to Andy Whetton who cynically sliced Slater down as the midfielder raced through on goal when a red card wouldn't have gone amiss.
On 63 minutes Barrow almost scored when Rhys Powell slid in for a tackle and the ball ballooned off the defender and it took a superb reflex save from Gresley keeper Simon Baldwin to prevent the goal.
Barrow did get on the score sheet on 74 minutes when substitute Ash Wignall was left free to head home a corner from the right.
Gresley reacted in the right way by pressing forward for more goals and Jamie Barrett almost obliged after racing into the box only to fire into the side netting.
The home side had its best spell of the game of the game forcing two corners and Ade Adelukan being denied by Baldwin's legs at the near post.
However, normal service was resumed as Gresley settled again with Woodall's pass being thumped into the side netting by substitute Jordi Gough and a volley from Gadsby flying just over the bar.
Gresley looked certain to add to their total with but another couple of fine saves from Allan firstly pushed Lyons' low shot away for a corner and then the stopper did well to block a shot from Gough.
A corner from Lyons was met powerfully by Gadsby who was unlucky to see his header crash back off the bar with Allan beaten.
The visitors had two more late chances to increase their advantage with substitute Stefan Marshall firing over and then he laid the ball on for Gadsby who had the ball taken off his toe as he was about to unleash a shot from close in.
Manager's View
"I'm not really disappointed that we only won three-one. We got three points and that's all that matters when you come away from home and a second half against a very tough wind like that. First half and even in the second half we wasted some chances but to come away and win three-one I'll take that every day.
"They've had a number of players booked as in the previous game against us. I think it's disgraceful and I actually think it's a tactic to put us out of our stride and I'd be ashamed to send a side out blatantly looking to stop you playing football in that manner.
"When you've got weak referees as well it can disrupt you. Some of the football we played especially in the first half was the best we've played all season and even with those tactics they couldn't quite get near us to foul us a lot of the time even though there were blatant attempts to do so.
"The biggest thing for me was their bench complaining when Rhys (Powell) dived out of the way. Yes, he dived out of the way because he knew what was coming and had he stayed there he probably would have been added to the injury list.
"He dived out of the way and the guy's fouled him and all their bench was on about was that he was a pansy - an absolute disgrace! I would never want o put a football team of mine out to try and win a game like that.
"Play football. If you can't beat us play football it's a simple as that. Don't try to rough us up. Fortunately we've learnt to cope with it in this league because we know it's physical. Sides like Radcliff who can play football and are very physical but as well but not as blatant as that.
"We try to bring people in like Martin Gadsby and Richard Butler to give us more steel in the side and fortunately today their (Barrow's) game plan didn't work for them.
"Fortunately, we haven't picked anymore injuries up other than Tom Betteridge's calf which he was carrying coming into the game. Hopefully, we haven't picked anything up today but as if the referee had put his authority on the game in the first half - and I'm not a manager who looks for players to be booked, I'm one of the fairest managers around - but there were one or two of their tackles in the first half, it's alright pulling them to one side and talking to them but after the seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth attempt to foul surely the referee should have started to protect us a little bit by issuing the cards.
"But the longer he keeps his cards in his pocket - the only yellow card in the first half was when Royce (Turville) had gone through and pushed the ball past their last defender and if he'd have stayed on his feet would have pushed it into an empty net and he's given a yellow card.
"I said to the referee at half time 'well it does prove you've brought your card with you'. As I've said I'm not a manager who wants to see players booked and sent off when it's as blatant as that and that's a central tactic I'm a bit annoyed with that.
"We saw Brad Clarke here before the start of the game and of course he's registered with our reserve team and they (Barrow) signed him yesterday. Their manager assured me that he only found out driving over that he was registered with Gresley and at the time we were expecting Brad to start so we had a little chat and they've already got seven days in for Simon Baldwin which expires on Monday.
"I've got to be sensible about it. I thought Brad was starting and we checked it out with their manager and in the spirit of the game we would allow him to be named but as it turned out he was only named on the bench but at the time I didn't know that.
"The FA want to know about it because they should have put seven days in and Barrow say they didn't know he was registered. Brad says he told John when he first made contact with him that he was signed for Gresley reserves but it's only a small issue I'm sure between the two clubs we will resolve it.
"I don't know if Simon Baldwin knows about the approach. I haven't told him as I didn't think it was appropriate to discuss it with him knowing he'd be involved in today's game so we'll have a chat with him afterwards. They've got a great keeper here, Tom Allan who they also got - I think they've got a bit of a thing for our goalkeepers at Barrow.
"Tommy's got a suspension coming up and some of their staff seemed surprised after the game to learn they'd put seven days in for Simon - I'm not sure Tommy knows so we'll have to weigh that one up.
"I'm sure if Simon feels he's going to get a fair crack of the whip at Gresley in the first team shirt, and he's done okay today, he'd want to stay at Gresley and we need two top drawer keepers at the club. If he does decide to leave and come here no problem we'll go out and bring another keeper in."
