Gill Cup Preliminary Round Thornwell Red and White 0 Underwood SC A 6

A NARROW defeat earlier this year provided all the incentive needed for Underwood SC A to progress to the Gill Cup first round proper at the weekend.

Underwood boss Craig Johnson admitted he didn’t need to motivate his men before the match.

Thornwell made Underwood’s promotion bid extra-hard with an unexpected 2-1 defeat on the 3G pitch on 9th January and that, together with being dumped out of the Benevolent Cup in a 3-0 defeat in September, made a pre-match team talk unnecessary.

Underwood went for their opponents from the kick-off but Thornwell are no easy targets.

With quality and experience right through the team, they are no-one’s mugs and the 2-0 half-time scoreline could just as easily have been 0-2 with a little more composure in front of goal.

The turning point was no doubt the departure through injury of goalkeeper Dan Northey at half time.

Northey has been playing with a back injury for some time, taking painkillers in order to play but on Saturday, while jumping to take a cross, he felt the injury worsen and was forced to go off, as player-manager Terry Woodward explained.

“We made a couple of silly mistakes for the first two goals but I thought we were still in it at half time,” he said

“Then we had a great chance to make it 2-1 when Tony Reynolds hit the post which could have changed the tie a bit.

“It didn’t help that they came straight back up our end and made it 3-0. We tried to push on but that just opened it up for them. Not a great performance but a big thank you to Matt Pearce for stepping in when Dan went off.”

From the third goal, players who would normally be going for goal were needed to reinforce the defensive wall in front of Pearce and so it proved with three more goals scored to complete the revenge mission, thanks to Sean Johnson, Tom Turner, Lee Ryder, Kyle Brown and Callum Ford (2).

Red and White players like Tom Chappell and Jordan Locke worked tirelessly but neither were able to make the telling pass or decisive run to really hurt an Underwood defence that was missing Justin Bidgood at its heart.

“It was a massive win for us,” Johnson said later.

“The players wanted to progress to the next round and prove we are better than them.

“I think the score line proved that and my players should be proud of their performance.

“Kyle Brown had a good game and enjoyed being back in his preferred position.”

Underwood are still in with a chance of earning promotion but it will have to be earned in the next five league matches and, even then, they need Severn Tunnel to slip up.