Woodley Sports 0
Nantwich Town 1
League (NW Counties League Div 1)

Match Report

Nantwich striker Wes Wilkinson may wear silver boots but the diminutive hitman appears to blazing a goal-den trail.
Wilkinson was on target for the fifth game in a row as ten man Nantwich put in a rousing display to topple the early season pace makers.
The result was all the more commendable as the player-boss Nigel Gleghorn had been forced to re-shuffle his pack, with Mark Gardiner, Mark Maguire and Ashley Lawton all making their first starts of the season.
The task was made all the more harder when the Dabbers were reduced to ten men inside ten minutes when skipper Melford Knight received marching orders for a reckless two-footed challenge. It was the visitors, though, who took control of the game.
Wilkinson’s trickery set up Otis Thomas whose drive was just wide of the mark and two minutes later Maguire was desperately unlucky to see his 25 yarder also slip wide of the target.
Nantwich keeper Simon Pay was called upon to parry Mike Norton’s shot onto the crossbar and he then had to backpeddle to fingertip an audacious long range effort from Gary Vaughan over the bar.
Nantwich’s winner came on 65 minutes when Wilkinson jinked down the left and was up-ended in the box by Micky Ryan. He got up, brushed himself down and rifled home the spot kick for his fifth goal of the campaign.
Ex-Nantwich winger Simon Hackney came close to equalising and Callum Dempsey headed over from a corner when well placed but, with rain and hail pelting down in a freak storm, the Dabbers withstood late pressure to claim a well deserved victory.
Woodley Higginbottom, Bromley, Wilson, Ryan, Egerton (Andrews,26), Dempsey, Fitzpatrick, Vaughan (Johnson,57), Norton, Hargreaves (Gaffey,57), Hackney. Booked: Norton (44mins), Andrews (80mins)
Nantwich Pay, Thomasson, Gardiner, Maguire, Hall, Vickers, Lawton, Knight, Thomas, Wilkinson, Griggs. Booked: Vickers (9mins), Lawton (66mins). Sent Off: Knight (8mins)

Match report written by Michael Chatwin