West Bridgford 4 v Barrow Town 3

The ducks had gone from the pitch and after a couple of days of milder drier weather it was in surprisingly firm condition. The game kicked off at a frenetic pace, with both teams showing their eagerness to be back playing again after the bad weather break. A sign of things to come arrived in just four minutes with a West Bridgford goal. Dave Erentz carried the ball out of defence, over the halfway line and played a pinpoint pass to Josh Kwadu near the penalty area. He in turn released Jurgen Charlesworth who smashed the ball in off the goalkeeper.
However, Bridgford's lead only lasted six minutes when a long punt from defence was chased by Barrow's lone striker Zak Ginvert. He outpaced three Bridgford defenders and cleverly headed the bouncing ball, from 25 yards out, over goalkeeper Clark.
It was end to end stuff with Barrow playing route 1 football and Bridgford a more Barcelona style route 10! Will Daly and Jack Gray were causing the Barrow boys problems with their tricky wing play on the left and the right.
Barrow almost took the lead when Clark mispunched a corner onto the bar, only for the rebound to be struck just wide.
In the 30th minute WB got a free kick 40 yards out. Will Heath pumped in a cross to Josh Kwadu who, in the blink of an eye, controlled the ball, turned and blasted a low shot into the net. Half time quickly came and it was 2-1 to the home side.
The second half started with West Bridgeford substituting Akin Akinbinu for Ross Haig. It looked all over when a great move involved, first a midfield, Heath pass to Kwadu. He passed the ball out to Gray on the right. Gray sprinted into the penalty area shaped to shoot but no -the ball was pulled back to Kwadu, who in acres of space carefully stuck the ball in the goal to make it 3-1.
Barrow would not yield. In the 55th minute Ginvert capitalised on a Taylor Gardner slip to get his and Barrow's second.
Then at 66 minutes, what seemed like the final nail in the Barrow coffin saw the unfortunate James Portwood chip his own goalkeeper and get on the scoresheet with an own goal. His mum and dad sitting behind me in the stand took it philosophically. Right at the death a deftly placed Zak Ginvert right footer flew into the top right of the goal to give him a rare losing hat trick and Barrow a final consolation. A couple of minutes later, the referee blew the final whistle allowing WB to celebrate an exciting 4 -3 victory.
Best wishes to Bridgford's gutsy man of the match and debut boy Nick Labatte. He finished the game but had to go to hospital with what has turned out to be a bad injury on a twice operated on knee. Bridgford with this second successive victory continue to slowly climb out of the relegation zone. However with matches against the top two teams in the next three fixtures they need to be on top form to continue this rise up the table.