Shortwood 4 Ludlow Town 1 – Supplementary Cup
Reminiscent of Shortwood’s last encounter with Ludlow—when Wood ran out 7-1 winners—late goals in quick succession gave the scoreline in this cup tie an impression of comfort, in spite of the relatively even contest played out for much of the game, writes Harry Ash.
The visitors started brightly, Charlie Clent bursting away down the left in the opening seconds, but his shot was well blocked by the scrambling Wood defence.
As that early scare suggested, it took Wood a while to settle, perhaps in part due to the much changed eleven named by Peter Beadle. Having said that, Jack Gardner, fielded as the lone frontman, scored with Wood’s first real chance of the game. Adi Adichareh’s pass looked to have been dealt with by the Ludlow backline, but the unfortunate Cam Marsh and Charlie Edwards collided with each other, giving Gardner a free run on goal. He coolly slotted past Zach Venables to make it 1-0.
But Wood’s advantage only lasted a matter of moments. Joe Wright’s poor clearance was picked up by Clent, who took advantage of Wright recovering his position by firing a shot into the top corner from twenty-five yards.
Wood reacted well in the following minutes, Adichareh testing Venables with a low effort before a lovely cushioned volley from Gardner floated just wide.
Ludlow remained a threat in the closing ten minutes of the half though. Harry Jones escaped down the left but his cutback somehow evaded everybody, a poor clearance then fell to Edwards, but his touch was heavy and Wright was able to gather before being fouled by the midfielder.
If it hadn’t already been the case in the first half, the start of the second clearly illustrated Ludlow’s gameplan, namely to let Wood have the ball deep and pounce on any loose play in build-up. It did frustrate the hosts, with Harley Morris and Ryan Clarke proving a threat on the break, but poor finishing proved their undoing.
When Wood did break through it was once again through Gardner. He robbed a ponderous Ludlow defender on the right before flashing a low cross into the path of Adichareh, but his delicate effort rolled wide of the far post.
With fifteen minutes to play, those two combined again and this time Gardner capitalised. Ollie Price found Adichareh on the edge of the box, and he played it first time into the path of Gardner, who once again showed composure to feed the ball past Venables into the near corner.
Wood then rang the changes, four to be exact, signalling a change of shape too. Ludlow must have been fearing the worst at the sight of Alfie Bradshaw, who had scored a brace in the 7-1 win. And sure enough, with five minutes to play, Bradshaw rose brilliantly to meet fellow substitute Cameron Blacker’s cross, heading into the ground and past the stranded Venables. A minute later he added a second and the fourth for Wood, beating the offside line to latch onto debutant Flyn Fox’s through ball, making no mistake with the finish.
Wood advanced in the Supplementary Cup, and the festive fixture list kicks off in earnest with the visit of Newent in the league next Saturday.
Shortwood: Wright, Price (Blacker), White, Mulraney (Flynn Fox), Keating, Royer, Cronin, King E, Gardner (Bradshaw), Cooke (Afriyie), Adichareh (King T)
MOM – Jack Gardner
