Early Own Goal Gives United 3 Points

Sutton United moved 11 points clear of the relegation zone on Saturday with a solid, if unspectacular, 1-0 win over Wrexham.

It was a bright start from Paul Doswell’s men rewarded after just 4 minutes after an Amankwaah long throw was allowed to bounce in the box and was flicked past Jalal in the Wrexham goal by the unfortunate Riley, under pressure from Biamou. As has been a theme in the league recently Sutton continued to dominate the early stages and looked to get a second goal, with the lively Deacon firing just wide of the post and a series of further long throws continuing to cause trouble for Wrexham who never seemed comfortable defending the ball into the box. However the Welsh side wouldn’t go down easily and improved after around 20 minutes or so, peppering the Sutton box with crosses. Unfortunately for them most of the crosses were poor and Worner was not unduly troubled. During this spell United still posed an attacking threat on the break, with Biamou denied by a last ditch tackle and Tubbs not quite getting enough power on an effort from the edge of the box. The visitors’ best chance of the half came through Rooney, who saw his shot well blocked after a good passing move. Just before the break Deacon almost made it two but was denied by a good save by Jalal.

Whilst the first half had been somewhat end to end and unpredictable the U’s set up to see the game out in the second half, and did a fine job of it with Wrexham not really a threat until they sent the big men forward in the final 10 minutes. Indeed the best chances of the half actually fell to Sutton, with Tubbs seeing an effort deflected just wide on 68 minutes and Jalal once again saving from Deacon a few minutes later. Having struggled to get behind Sutton for most of the game Wrexham started to have a bit more luck as the clock wound down, but couldn’t force the ball over the line when a good chance fell to White – his header and follow up effort both blocked on the line. With plenty of deep crosses pumped into the box there were chances late on for the visitors but neither Riley nor White could get their headers on target. There was concern for Sutton late on as Worner went down but fortunately he was ok to see the game out, hopefully with no lasting damage

Paul Doswell, speaking to SUFCtv after the game, was satisfied with what he saw:

“We weren’t at our best today but I thought it was quite an exciting game, we had 3 or 4 efforts go just past the post in the second half and then you had the inevitable last 7 or 8 minutes where they were launching stuff in the box – they could have had an equaliser right at the death but thankfully he put it wide”

“If you look at this club today, 1600 people there, beating a famous league club, it shows how far we’ve come in the last year”

“We needed us a second goal to give us that comfort as in the last 10 minutes they were always going to be looking to press forward – they stuck all their centre halves in the box with big diagonal balls to defend – I thought Collins was outstanding and so was Downer”

“I thought most of the lads were sixes and sevens today, which was enough to give us the win”

Photo credit: Max Camilleri

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