Thorverton 3 4 Wellington Reserves
A robust and highly pleasing result and performance by Wellington Reserves in deepest, darkest Devon saw them beat current Devon and Exeter League champions Thorverton on their own patch last weekend; that the home side scored three goals does rather flatter them as they were awarded one of the most dreadful penalty decisions you will ever see, were gifted an equaliser and they found Wellington static at the back to give them a third – really Thorverton had the look of fallen champions.
Wellington delivered a fine defensive response in the first half and they could have been out of sight as early as the break as Craig Aspin was well saved on several occasions by the home keeper – Aspin tried to chip the ball over the keeper when he was on the deck and somehow was foiled, but he kept going and unleashed a couple of a stinging shots later in the half.
The breakthrough came when Danny Thomas rose to head home a well delivered Wellington corner and this was reward for good all round play by the Tangerines second string.
A thunderbolt of a shot from midfielder Chris McKee doubled Wellington’s lead; he had a fine game for Wellington in the middle of the park and his tough tackling style earned excellent possession all game long.
Then came Wellington’s dodgy spell as the referee made a penalty award that was just plain wrong for hand ball against Tangerines skipper Steve Luxon who went into the book for his protests and when Chris Cherry came out of his goal to clear the ball he missed and presented an open goal to Thorverton to get back on level terms with; they did not deserve to be so.
Wellington had to regroup and come up with a response and it came in the form of a second thunderbolt of the game – this time Nathan Thomas rifled one in off the post and left the Thorverton keeper beaten by a rocket for the second time; for one who had a lot to say he certainly zipped up thereafter!
Thomas complimented his all round play with this goal and is was great to have his elder brother Danny back in the team following a bad broken wrist and even John Norman made a comeback as he played the last thirty minutes or so at centre back following a torn hamstring that he had suffered at Thorverton in a Cup match last August.
Ashley Gaines made it four for Wellington with a near post goal and that had surely sealed the game and the points for Dave Thomas’ side, but Thorverton had time to loop one in and make it three for them and actually had the ball in the back of the net for a fourth time, but they were well off side by the time the ball had been hit.
Wellington took three valuable points home with them and have a home game at last next weekend and it is a most important one as bottom side Exmouth Amateurs visit North Street for a 2.15pm KO.
Wellington are now 13th on 13 points and will hope to be three more points better off by 4.30pm next Saturday and well into mid table by then, but there is such a jam in the middle of the division that one result sends you high and a loss sends you way back down again.
This game will be the last early KO for this season – there is no game on Saturday 29th January and then it is back to 3.00pm when the team go to league leaders Seaton on Saturday 5th February.
