Wealdstone 1 – 1 Northwood
Wealdstone1 - 1
NorthwoodStones made a couple of changes after Saturday’s defeat at Banbury with Chappell, Carroll and O’Leary all returning to the line-up, and they looked a stronger tighter unit for it.
Starting brightly, the first chance fell to Papali whose effort was easily gathered by Bullivant in the Northwood goal, but it was the visitors who may have taken the lead on 16 when Dean was tripped in the area, though the Referee waved play on.
Stones had the better of the half over all, Montgomery, Papali and Clark all having efforts saved or blocked, while at the other end, Northwood could have opened the scoring through Dean Warner and Hall. It was the visitors that took the lead when they were awarded a penalty on 44 minutes. To all around (including the players) the decision, made by the assistant referee seemed a surprise, but it later transpired that Caroll had committed an offence and his subsequent booking may well have seen a red card with another official in charge. Nicholls duly stepped up to score from the spot.
within a minute though, Stones were level as Chappell broke down the right flank. He clipped the ball past the full back and ran on to strike a great cross deep into the box when Clark headed towards the far corner, only to see Bullivant at full stretch palm the header away – fortunately for Stones to Montgomery who scored from 4 yards in the last action of the half.
As the second half progressed, Northwood created the better chances but some solid defending preventing them taking the lead, while again Papali and Mackie had decent opportunities for Wealdstone.
The match wasn’t a classic, buit it was better fare than could really have been expected from two sides struggling at the bottom of the table, and the draw was probably a fair result.
Wealdstone: Lee Carroll44, Josias Carbon, Fergus Moore15, Carl Martin, Lee Chappell, Graham Hall s45 Hector Mackie, Dean Clark, Chris O’Leary 85, Ernest Simon s76 Josh Cooper, Dean Papali s88 John Christian, Graeme Montgomery 45, Subs Not Used: Stuart Goodall, Adriano De Moraes