MOVING ON UP
Solihull 0 Yeltz 1
26 October 2003
The mighty Yeltz continued their rise up the table with an excellent 1-0 victory over Solihull Borough. A second-half goal from the league's top scorer Jason Ashby brought us an important three points and moved us up to 6th in the table and still with games in hand over most of the teams above us. More details in DJ's match report.
Because of their FA Cup replay Tuesday's League Cup tie at Bromsgrove is postponed , so our next game is on Saturday when we travel to play Team Bath in the FA Trophy.
Match Report from DJ
Solihull Borough: Gayle; Hamilton, Hier (Hawker 72), Preston, Barry, A. Cooper, Campbell, I. Cooper, Hunter, Arshad (Amos 66), Lutz (Hewitt 78). Unused Sub: Dodd
Halesowen Town: Lowe; Colwell, Charlton, Grocutt, Jones, Baker, Hollis, Ashby, Holmes, Spencer, Kavanagh. Unused Subs: Hallam, Steane, Smith, Mitchell, Small
Referee: R. J. Steans (Loughborough) Attendance: 326 Booked: I. Cooper (15)
Jason Ashby secured three points by notching his 16th goal of the season with a stunning second half strike after missing an earlier penalty.
Halesowen goalkeeper Matt Lowe was barely troubled all afternoon as the Yeltz took charge and they should have won by a greater margin as Solihull failed to live up to expectations.
In a quiet opening, David Holmes lobbed over the Solihull bar in the 7th minute and then turned to win Halesowen's first corner after 13 minutes. Darren Grocutt headed a Simon Hollis free-kick tamely at goalkeeper Mark Gayle on 20 minutes and with the visitors comfortably on-top Andy Spencer cut in from the right for Gayle to save low down two minutes later. Spencer then flicked a 25th minute header just wide from Richard Kavanagh's 25th minute cross.
Dan Jones gifted Solihull their best and only meaningful chance of the game when he failed to notice Adam Cooper behind him and left a 27th minute cross but Lowe raced off his line with the ball being cleared in the resulting goal-mouth scramble.
Pete Barry brought down ex-Solihull midfielder Hollis from behind in the 33rd minute to give Halesowen a penalty but ex-Halesowen goalkeeper Gayle used his knowledge from his former club to read Ashby's usual routine and dived to his left to push away the spot-kick.
The visitors continued to dominate the second half with Kavanagh volleying a 57th minute Hollis cross over the bar. Paul Hunter put Jamie Campbell through on the hour for the home side but Lowe was on hand to save.
Halesowen sealed the game in the 64th minute with a goal of pure class from ASHBY who picked up a pass from Jones and turned a full circle before curling into the top corner from 15 yards for a worthy "goal of the season" candidate
Hollis then brought a flying save out of Gayle with a fierce half-volley from the right after 73 minutes. At the other end, Halesowen were never seriously threatened further although Adam Cooper glanced a free-header straight at Lowe in the dying seconds.