Shot to bits: Aldershot 2 – Forest Green Rovers 3
by Tom Parker
Aldershot wasn’t quite where I last left it, which is a shame — because poor geography scuppered my easy headline, “All Berkshire and No Bite.” Not that it would have been fair anyway.
What began as the vegan equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel ended as a modest but hard-earned victory. We pretty much battered our vegan fish, yes — but they wriggled back, and for four alarming minutes proved remarkably slippery.
For the record, Aldershot is in Hampshire — a far trickier prospect for wordplay. Something about being hamp-ered, perhaps? Or simply damp? The day itself was warm and bright, but for the first hour there wasn’t much crispness about the garrison-town squad.
The Shots huffed and puffed, but the most stirring puffing came from a fine troop of bagpipers who paraded the pitch at half-time — part morale-booster, part Remembrance Sunday tribute.
Forest Green showed no sign of surrender before the break. By the 61st minute, we were three goals to the good — Kyle McAllister completing a goal sandwich with a particularly tasty Jayden Clarke filling. For the 220 or so travelling fans, there was a rare sense that, just for once, a trip to Aldershot wouldn’t turn into the usual nail-biter.
That feeling lasted all of seven minutes. Midfielder Ciaran Gilligan and forward Kwame Thomas (gifted an unmissable header) dragged two back for the Shots, and suddenly we all knew what it must feel like to be a Luton fan.
Aldershot remain a conundrum: free-scoring, yet defensively porous. Thirty-one goals scored since August, but 39 conceded — a combination that has left them, in new manager John Coleman’s own blunt words, “cemented” near the foot of the table.
If following FGR sometimes feels like a prescription-free anxiety trial, imagine the statistical psychosis of supporting Aldershot. Being far too much of an empath, I almost wished they hadn’t fought back so valiantly. Those two goals flicked the oxygen switch in the East Bank, hope returned — and we all know how that ends.
To prolong the suspense, our side seemed perfectly content to manage the clock rather than the margin. The introduction of the headmasterly Jordan Moore-Taylor at the back provided calm authority, and — mercifully — we saw the game out without the usual late drama. Still, we never do seem to make things easy for ourselves, do we?
If omens matter, the day’s journey offered one. A stretch of resurfacing near Lambourn closed part of the M4, diverting eastbound traffic on a three-hour meander through Basingstoke’s bridle paths. Like the sat-nav’s wiggly line, what should have been a straightforward trip became unexpectedly testing. But we got there in the end.
Next up: Tamworth and Gateshead, both at The New Lawn. Two home games, six points on offer — an easy haul, surely?
