Blue Square Bet South
Truro City 2 Boreham Wood 1
by John Mead
Behind the veil of mist that engulfed the Treyew Road Stadium the Cornishmen earned their first win in six matches, ending Wood’s unbeaten run of five.
With Daniel Brathwaite unavailable there was a First Team League debut for eighteen year old PASE player Lee Close at left back, who continued his excellent week after being called up to represent England Colleges. This week he flies out to Italy along with Charlie Hunter and Ruddock Yala to compete in an International Tournament, giving Wood a trio of representatives at National level.
It was an atmospheric evening with play difficult to follow at some stages due to the weather. In truth Wood missed the creativity of the injured Mario Noto in the centre of the park on the night.
A goal filled evening looked on the cards after the Tiger Whites took the lead after just eleven minutes. A fine piece of defending from Callum Reynolds looked to have repelled any danger, yet a ball whipped in from the right was headed down into the bottom corner of the net by Marcus Martin.
Wood were behind for just eight minutes. A Graeme Montgomery corner was cleared to David Bryant whose first time effort rippled the back of the net from just inside the penalty area, taking his League tally into double figures.
The rest of the half was a war of attrition between the two sides. The best two chances fell to Bryant and had he done better it may have been a different long journey back for Ian Allinson’s men.
Racing through on goal he took the ball inside his marker who appeared to catch him, yet nothing untoward was spotted by the Officials, whom like the fans were having a difficult time following the ball.
Then minutes later with only the ‘keeper to beat he executed a shot that bounced to safety off the ‘keeper’s rear.
Elvijs Putnins was rarely troubled in the Wood goal, yet found himself picking the ball out of the net after fifty-six minutes. Close, who had a fine game for the Senior side, was undone by the uneven surface, the ball bobbling to allow a whipped cross form the right which was converted by Stewart Yetton.
Thereafter stalemate prevailed with the home side shutting down any foraging operations in the mist that Wod endeavoured to build, making it a frustrating evening for the small band of travelling fans.
With both Bryant and Omer Riza replaced late on by the youthful duo of Harvey Scott-Morris and Dean Rubinia, a late chance of an equaliser manifested itself courtesy of the PASE players on show. A fine ball from Close picked out Scott-Morris whose shot from just outside the area looked destined for the back of the net before cannoning off a defender’s head to safety.
According to Wood boss Ian Allinson there was little to choose between the two sides. “The main difference was our ever re-occurring problem, we are not taking our chances when they come. Truro City had two decent chances all game and took both of them, whilst we only took one of our three or four good chances in the first half. I would have said a draw would have been a fair result, however it was a bit difficult to analyze the game as a whole due to the conditions. I have no idea how Graeme Montgomery performed in the first half for me, as he was on the opposite side of the ground and the same goes for Mauro Vilhete in the second half! That said the last thing we would have wanted was an abandonment!”
Team: Putnins, Sankofa, Close, Garrard, Reynolds, Beckles, Vilhete, Cox, Bryant (Sub – Scott-Morris 84 mins.), Riza (Sub – Rubinia 84 mins.), Montgomery (Sub – Hutton 77 mins.).
Subs (Not used): Jordan, Doolan.
Goals: Truro City: Martin 11, Yetton 56. Boreham Wood: Bryant 19.
Man of the Match: David Bryant.
