Brereton Social vs Gresley Rovers
It’s Hall in a day’s work for prize Guy – Burton Mail
Gresley Rovers new boy Guy Hall exploded on the Banks’s league scene on Saturday – then revealed his reasons for shunning Burton Albion’s cup cavalcade.
Hall played a key part in a priceless Rovers victory at Brereton and took a large step towards easing the nightmare memory of his final months at Eton Park
There was one very good reason why even the scent of silverware on a grand scale could not stop him leaving the Brewers.
“I just wanted to start enjoying my football again,” he said. “It had got to the stage where I didn’t look forward to Saturday’s – and that’s got to be a bad sign. All the success in the world is no good if you’re not happy – going to Wembley would have been no use to me if I had been sitting on the bench.”
The mounting frustrations of those afternoons wearing the number 12 shirt were evident from the first time Hall picked up the ball in midfield and launched into that distinctive lumbering stride.
His belligerent contribution from the central midfield role he enjoys most added a touch of much-needed steel to the Moatmen’s engine room and won the admiration of manager Frank Northwood.
“He’s fit, strong and he talks well. I thought he had an excellent game,” said Northwood.
Hall’s booking ten minutes from time was the only black mark on a Rovers’ performance which bore one of the hallmarks of a quality side – patience.
The match was into its final quarter before they made the breakthrough but by full time three immaculately constructed goals had reduced a very ordinary Brereton side to the role of petulant onlookers.
A superbly-worked free kick routine provided the all important opener as Steve Dolby side footed home Brian Beresford’s precise knock down of Mark Bromley’s free kick.
Beresford would have made it two but for a brutal assault by goalkeeper Martin Conneally two minutes later, but when Rovers’ second did arrive after 78 minutes it was well worth waiting for.
John Bottomley started the move with a short ball to Jon Laws who surged past a challenge before finding Gary Stevens via Beresford’s neat dummy and when the little winger pulled the ball back from the bye-line Laws had continued his run perfectly to convert a close-range header.
Dean Page had been belatedly ordered off when the rout was well and truly completely four minutes from time.
The excellent Bottomley again played a key role with another run which defied the offside trap and although his unselfish square pass to Stevens was over hit, the former Willenhall man recovered and found Beresford who seldom missed from six yards out.
Brereton Social (0) 0
Gresley Rovers (0) 3
Scorers: Dolby 69, Laws 79, Beresford 87.
Brereton Social: Conneally, Bailey, S Glaister, Rickards, Knapton, Page, J Glaister, Perry, Youll, Poole (Harvey 82), Griffiths.
Gresley Rovers: Austin, Bottomley, Earley, Laws, Dolby, Bromley, Arthur, Philpott, Stevens, Beresford, Hall. Sub not used: Pearsall.
Gresley man-of-the-match: Guy Hall.
Referee: A W Smith (Rubery).
Attendance: 137
