Match Report
Brocton 4 Cheadle Heath Nomads 0
25th November 2023 – North West Counties Division One South
A bitterly cold and crisp day at Silkmore saw Cheadle Heath Nomads the visitors, on what was the opening day of the second half of the season for the Badgers. Nomads arrived in good form, just outside of the playoffs, and really should have opened the scoring on 2 mins, but the Denise couldn’t steer his shot goalwards. However, the Badgers started to assert themselves in the middle of the park with Reg hitting a couple of ranger finders. On 11, awarded a free kick on the edge of the box on the left hand side, Reg Smith hit a low shot towards goal, but a deflection from the Cheadle defence took it past the keeper. The Badgers kept upping the gears first with Will Whieldon hitting a fantastic cross which Morgan Payne just couldn’t reach and Connor Haddaway leading the midfield. However, the game twisted again as Kenny Devoir was shown a red card. As the ball landed in front of him, Kenny cleared the ball but Modl came in from his left at the wrong time and Kenny clattered into him. With a poor angle to view the challenge, to everyone’s shock, the referee sent Kenny off and Badgers down to 10 men. The numerical advantage certainly didn’t play into the visitors hands as Brocton compacted the midfield and still attacked. Payne tried an outrageous lob which just drifted wide, but then Reg Smith was equally as spontaneous moments later. Around 35 yards out, he turned and hit a low hard shot at goal. Smith in the Nomads goal, totally wrong footed and the ball nestled into the left hand corner. Despite the effort from the visitors, the defence were not in the mood to concede and the half ended 2-0.
Nomads changed two players at half time to force the game, but no sooner than on the pitch the visitors found themselves 3 down. A Reg Smith shot half cleared towards the edge of the box, saw Will Whieldon latch onto the loose ball and fire it hard past Smith, more goals scored with 10 men than 11 at this point! The play around the midfield and forward line at this point was Brocton back to their scintillating best and it was that interplay which led to the fourth. Just outside the box, Morgan Payne fed the ball to the left for Reg Smith to latch on to, off balance, another low hard shot saw Smith unable to handle and the hat-trick was complete. Credit to Nomads, constantly looking for opportunities with Morton now on causing difficulty on the right hand side. Tony Allsopp perhaps though, only had one real shot to contend with which he gathered well, but testament to Ben Haddaway, Tom Vaughan, Charlie Marshall and Charlie King for not letting the visitors past. An excellent moment for our U18’s teams as both Ben Hackett and Seb Conaghan came on, with the later almost forcing a chance for the 5th, but testament to our youth policy seeing three 18 year olds playing today.
Team : Allsopp, King, Marshall, Devoir, Vaughan, B Haddaway, Whieldon, Thomas, Smith, C Haddaway, Payne.
Subs used; Douglas, Hackett, Green-Birch, Conaghan, Osborne
Sent off: Devoir
Goals: Smith (11,38,58) Whieldon (48)
Attendance: 133
