Creaney and Wilson fire Town to victory over Greenbacks

FOOTBALL

Evo-Stik Southern Premier Central Bedworth United 0-2 Stratford Town

Report by Bryan Hale

STRATFORD Town duly collected three points from their visit to already relegated Bedworth United - but it certainly wasn’t straightforward against their spirited opponents.

Town’s starting line-up showed four changes from last weekend beginning in goal where Ross Etheridge returned following the end of Laurence Bilboe’s loan spell.

Kynan Isaac replaced the unavailable Wilson Carvalho on the left of midfield while Mo Sebbeh-Njie and Dan Creaney came in for James Fry and Mike Taylor respectively.

Both sides had free-kicks from promising positions in the opening five minutes, with Will Grocott firing Stratford’s inches over followed by Etheridge easily dealing with Alex Troke’s effort for Bedworth.

Ex-Town favourite James Hancocks was understandably eager to get into the action and soon had a fiercely struck shot blocked and another fizz inches over, but it was Stratford who came close to opening the scoring after 20 minutes when Bedworth James Fogg beat away a decent attempt from Nabil Shariff.

Five minutes later Fogg did even better with a reflex point-blank save from a Crenaey header, and it was Coalville Town loanee who went close with another header in the 37th minute, but Bedworth were showing plenty of commitment and the game was still goalless at half-time.

Stratford stepped up a gear after the break and only three minutes into the second half Fogg had to plunge to his left to push away a Shariff header. Bedworth struggled to deal with the loose ball and it eventually fell to Creaney on the edge of the penalty area who thumped it past Fogg to put Stratford ahead.

But ten minutes later their lead was only kept intact by the woodwork when Elliott Parrott’s low drive from 20 yards out cannoned against Etheridge’s left-hand post with the keeper well beaten.

Stratford, though, were now showing a bit more of their quality and doubled their lead on 65 minutes when a Grocott cross from the right was flicked on by Jordan Williams and headed in by his centre back partner Lewis Wilson.

From then on the result was never really in doubt and Bedworth’s difficulties were increased when Reece Blackmore was sent off after picking up a second yellow card with ten minutes to go as Stratford saw the game out to keep their play-off hopes very much alive.