Northfield Town Reserves 2 v 1 Coleshill Town

[Alan Beckett]

Saturday 17th October 1970
Midland Combination Division One
Northfield Town Reserves 2 v 1 Coleshill Town
Scorers:
Northfield: Burnly, Shepherd.
Coleshill: Roy Phelps.


Team: Peter Garnell GK, Clive Lyons, David Back, Tim Rawlings, Geoff Statham, Martin Curtis, Colin Davis (Dave Hughes, debut), Roy Phelps, Roy Sanders, Oscar Deeming, Eddie Hanlon. Confirmed.


COLESHILL CHRONICLE WROTE
Coleshill Lead - But Slump To Fourth Defeat
Coleshill Town, last season's Midland Combination Second Division champions, lost their fourth game of the season on Saturday, when they went down to Northfield Reserves after leading one goal to nil at half time. Coleshill's last success was over Northfield, at Coleshill, a few weeks ago and although their form of late has been mediocre they were quite hopeful of gaining their first "double" of the term. This hope was held high when it was known that Geoff Statham was returning to the side while former Town skipper Tim Rawlings made his first re-appearance.Coleshill promised well in the opening half and were fully justified in taking a single goal interval lead but Northfield gradually wore them down and with the ball and luck running their way, ran out winners. It was Coleshill's cool, calculated distribution that kept the home side defence busy in the opening stages, Coleshill having mainly one thing upper-most in their minds, to get back to winning ways. The Northfield goal bore a charmed life as Coleshill forced the pace and Hanlon's meanacing crosses brought real danger, first Phelps then Sanders seeing their part of the bargain swept away off the goal line with keeper Tye unsighted. Northfield gradually weathered the storm and the efforts provided by Tasker and Burnly raised their hopes but Garnell was kept out of trouble by defebders Statham and Rawlings, the latter providing the game with that old professional magic, he has played for Walsall and West Bromwich Albion. Coleshill were still looking the better side and found luck deserting them when Deeming split the defence but the ball bouncing oddly preventing Phelps from scoring. Northfield were being kept busy at the back and Davis had bad luck when his first time shot skimmed the bar and his header moved only inches past the post. After Phelps had steered another fine header just wide, Coleshill at last found success when in the 30th minute Martin Curtis placed a perfect centre for Phelps to head neatly into the Northfield net. Northfield took Coleshill's lead very much to heart and for the remaining 15 minutes made valient efforts to peg back their visitors success but with Garnell answering every call with emaculate handling, Coleshill still kept their slender lead. The second half had only been running five minutes when Colin Davis was forced to retire with a stomach upset and was replaced by new signing Dave Hughes and from then on Coleshill began to drift to defeat.Northfield for the first time started to take charge of proceedings and the equaliser, that always looked on, arrived in the 70th minute. A Coleshill attack broke up and Tasker was away like a greyhound to submit a perfect cross for Burnly to nod past Garnell. Coleshill, far from beaten came within an ace of reclaiming the lead when Hughes left Hanlon clear to run through but Tye made a brilliant save. Coleshill kept well in the fray and a neat back pass by Hanlon saw Hughes track in a hard drive, it beat Tye only to travel just wide. Several incidents arrived in which non of the players appeared to understand the referee's decisions and it was from such a tangle that Northfield were presented with the winning goal. A free kick that for all intents and purposes should have benifited Coleshill, fell to Northfield and from it Sheppard scored. The ball was floated high and dry into the net over Coleshill's packed defensive wall.


P13 W4 D5 L4 F19 A15 Pts13 Pos 4/18