A clean sheet, two nicely-taken goals and a second half to forget is not a bad summary of Yeovil Town’s first trip to Wealdstone in many supporters’ memories.
But, given the background to the past few weeks at Huish Park with the passing of captain Lee Collins, many would agree that a fourth win from the last six is a great result for Darren Sarll’s men.
It moved the Glovers up to the top of the bottom half in 13th place in the National League and this is how it played out…..
FIRST HALF
The Glovers’ starting XI was unchanged from the 3-0 home win over Solihull Moors on Tuesday night, with the only changed coming on the bench where Alex Bradley returned from injury to replace Rhys Murphy, and young keeper Max Evans took the place of Matt Worthington.
It did not take long to figure out why Wealdstone have conceded six and seven in their previous two home games with Billy Sass-Davies heading just wide before Joe Quigley had good chance blocked.
In the 14th minute, a Charlie Lee cross found Chris Dagnall who laid it back to Tom KNOWLES who hammered home a crisp strike to open the scoring.
Quigley had a good chance six minutes later when a quick throw from Knowles found him in the box, he showed a good first touch but put the ball wide with his second.
The in-form striker made amends on 23 minutes when, after a number of shots rained in from the Glovers, the ball landed to QUIGLEY in the box and he coolly slotted in his fourth in two games.
One disappointing thing in the first half was a yellow card for Lee who talked himself in to the book after ex-Glovers’ loanee Connor Smith shoved Tom Knowles in the back.
We’ve spoken on the podcast about the frustration of players getting booked for dissent, and it could have cost Lee shortly after when he put in a feisty tackle. That said, Smith proved himself to be a bit of a plum – to put it politely.
One peculiar thing which those tuning in to the live stream will have noticed, was the number of people who appeared to be inside the ground; perhaps it was the camera angle but it certainly seemed busy on the near side.
When the half-time whistle blew, the biggest disappointment was that it was only 2-0 to the Glovers.
Half time: Wealdstone 0 Yeovil Town 2
SECOND HALF
The start of the second half belonged to Wealdstone’s teenage keeper Jake Askew who pulled off two great saves to deny Sass-Davies‘ header and Lee‘s shot from successive Dickinson corners.
Just before those saves, there were three penalty appeals – two for Yeovil and one for the Wealdstone – none of which given surprisingly considering the referee was not afraid to get his cards out with four bookings apiece.
Quigley had a shot cleared off the line shortly after but, despite their chances, there was not a huge amount of quality on show with the hosts seemingly bringing Yeovil down to their level.
Wealdstone’s finishing proved to be as poor as their defending with Charlie Hughes putting a free header over – albeit the linesman’s flag was up, not that he knew that.
That said, it was the hosts who had the better of possession but could not punish some shaky defending from Yeovil.
Sarll responded by bringing on Emmanuel Sonupe and Reuben Reid to try and push on for more goals in the closing stages.
Sonupe had a great run forward, only to run in to a blind alley, and Neufville had a moment of indecisiveness in the box which saw another opportunity peter out.
Possibly the highlight of the second half was seeing Alex Bradley come on for his first appearance since the middle of March, and in true Yeovil Town versatile fashion the full-back slotted in to midfield.
That said, a second successive clean sheet, a couple of decent goals, a hard-fought second half if lacking in quality will keep us all happy.
Full time: Wealdstone 0 Yeovil Town 2 (Knowles, Quigley)
WEALDSTONE: Askew, Phillips, Olowu, Okimo (c), Wishart, Charles, Smith, Dyer, Green, Mendy, Lewis.
Subs not used: Shelvey, Hughes, Parish, Lo-Everton, Gondoh.
Bookings: Smith, Charles, Phillips, Wishart.
YEOVIL TOWN: A. Smith, Dickinson (c), Kelly, Sass-Davies, Skendi, J.Smith, Lee, Knowles, Neufville, Quigley, Dagnall.
Subs not used: Evans, Sonupe, Hunt, Bradley, Reid.
Bookings: Lee, Quigley, Skendi, Kelly.