Grays Athletic 0 Stevenage Borough 1 (F.A. Trophy Semi-Final 1st Leg) -- Matches -- Grays Athletic F.C.

The Recreation Ground, Bridge Road,
Grays, Essex, RM17 6BZ
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Matches

Grays Athletic 0 Stevenage Borough 1 (F.A. Trophy Semi-Final 1st Leg)
Sat, March 10, 2007. Kick off: 3:00 PM

Match Report by Martin Candler

A headed goal by defender Santos Gaia, the visitor‘s only effort on target in the match, gave Stevenage the advantage in the 1st leg of the Trophy semi-final. In a tetchy encounter, Grays could not translate their territorial superiority into goals, a failing that has haunted them for some time. The Blues started brightly and efforts by Johnny Martin and Gavin Grant went wide and Tom Williamson blasted high over when well placed. Stevenage, for their part, were surprisingly cautious with top scorer, the willing Steve Morison, asked to plough a lone furrow up front and adopted a spoiling, niggly approach to the game to deny Grays any fluency. For some reason, late in the first half, Grays suddenly looked nervous in defence and basic errors almost presented the visitors with a gift score on several occasions.

In the 56th minute, Alan Julian made a point blank save from Grant before the game hotted up and even the two managers had a spat on the touchline. Credit, however, should go to referee Mr.A.Hall who tried, with difficulty, to let the game flow and could have shown the red card to both skippers; Stuart Thurgood and Ron Henry, for fouls committed after they had previously received yellow cards but sensibly preferred to give them a ticking off instead.

In the 72nd minute, straight after a Grays attacker was clearly obstructed in the box, a floated free-kick from sub Mitch Cole was headed in by Gaia without any serious challenge by the Grays defence. The introduction of Alex Rhodes brought fresh energy to the Grays attack, and in their best spell of the match, Rhodes hit the post and saw a shot go just wide, and Jamie Stuart rattled the bar with a header from close range.

Not a classic cup-tie by any means but the Blues ,although beaten, were by no means disgraced

Grays Athletic: Bayes: Sambrook, Stuart, Thurgood, Oli, Tonkin, Martin, Williamson (Rhodes 72), Mawer, Poole, Grant.
Subs Not Used: Knowles, Barness, Nicholls, Joseph-Dubois.

Booked: Mawer, Thurgood.

Attn: 1918

Ref: A Hall (W Midlands).

Fans Man of the Match: Thurgood

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