Brocton FC

Tuesday 21st February

Brocton 4 Stafford Town 1

Staffordshire FA Vase Quarter Final

A cagey first few minutes erupted into action when Stafford Town’s Jordan Bloor headed away a throw only for David Harvey to collect the ball and prod it forward. Sam Bell was alert and got to the ball first, sliding it past Russell Todd in Town’s goal.
Bell almost put in Richard Jones moments later as the pair combined in an overlap on the right and Jones cut inside onto his left just inside the penalty box. His shot was on target and Todd did well to parry it away for a corner at full stretch.
The visitors weathered the early set back and gradually came into the game with some good movement in possession and stout defending when Brocton had the ball. They kept the home side at arms length and although they were unable to create serious goal scoring opportunities for themselves, they did at least prevent further inroads on their own goal.
Just a sprint for a loose ball by Mick Fox, getting beyond the back line and only stopped by a trip, caused the hearts to flutter but the resulting free kick went just wide of the post.
Going in at half time only the one goal in arrears town had every hope of improving their position in the second half and honours were even for the first half an hour of that period with Stafford Town enjoying the better of the possession, but still unable to create real goal scoring chances.
It was a break down the left flank from substitute Joe Pickering which was the catalyst for Brocton’s second. Pickering’s low cross into the box could not be properly cleared and Dave Berks collected the ball, made himself room and powered a shot past Todd form some twenty five yards.
Gary Fife could then have made the game safe as Dan Lomas found him inside the box, but Fife’s shot was well saved.
A series of free kicks for Town had come to nothing, but then, with ten minutes left to play, the ball finally fell for them in the box and Dave Woodvine snapped up the chance.
With the final whistle approaching there was everything to play for, but it was Brocton who struck again as Bell latched on to a ball over the Town back line and prodded his shot past Todd.
That seemed to be the final action, but there was still time for Bell to pounce once more in the dying seconds of added time to put Brocton into the semi final.

Brocton: Adam Whitehouse, Richard Jones, Jamie Evans, Andy Chandler,
Matt Skinner, Dave Harvey, Sam Bell, Mick Fox, Gary Fife, Dave Berks,
Dan Lomas.
Used Substitutes: Joe Pickering, Andy Bourne, Richard Miller.