Thanks again to Rory Sheehan who will be providing match reports and feature articles
Altrincham 1 Wrexham 2
Wrexham made hard work of disposing of divisional rivals part-time Altrincham in the 3rd Round of the Setanta Shield, having to endure an extra half an hour of extra-time before our passage into the next round was secured.
This might be seem like a minor competition to some, but the prize money on offer, however small, is not to be sniffed at when you have exited the FA Cup surprisingly early.
The outnumbering of the home fans by Wrexham’s travelling support in a crowd of just over 500 showed how the locals viewed the game, but Dean Saunders was taking this very seriously. A strong starting line-up saw Christian Smith replace Wes Baynes on the right as the only chance from Saturday. Ex-Dragon Marc McGregor lined-up for ‘Alty’.
Altrincham had held us to a frustrating draw earlier in the season and were doing their best to frustrate us again, hurrying Wrexham’s play and breaking quickly. Wrexham were never in any real danger however.
The Dragons had plenty of the ball too but lacked the cutting edge in the final third that would have turned our neat midfield play into an advantage. The only really significant event of the half was the home side’s early substitution of Greg Young for Chris Lane.
Wrexham made an early substitution themselves at half-time with Silvio Spann replacing right-back Ritchie De Laet. Just minutes after the interval Wrexham took the lead when a concise through ball from Jefferson Louis played Marc Williams into the area and through on goal, the resulting shot from Williams clipping the post as it went in
The lead lasted barely 5 minutes saw calamitous defending by Wrexham culminated in a real clanger from goalkeeper Gavin Ward, punching a clearance straight to Alex Meechan who lobbed Ward for the equaliser.
Fortunately the commanding presence of Ashley Westwood marshalling the defence prevented any further slip-ups, but despite the invention of Mackin and Tsiaklis in midfield Wrexham rarely threatened going forward. The game headed into extra-time, with Simon Brown having replaced Christian Smith 25 minutes earlier.
The game continued in a similar vein until just over 10 minutes into the first period when Louis missed a sitter. He failed to connect with a low ball from Marc Williams on the edge of the area and a gilt-edged opportunity went begging.
Into the second period of extra-time Tom Kearney replaced Mackin and minutes later Wrexham regained the lead. Simon Brown pulled the ball back from the byline for Louis to control and fire home from close-range, sending us into the next round.
The performance lacked quality and the extra-time would have been more frustrating had we a game scheduled this weekend, but most importantly we won the game, place in the next round, and the prize money.
After the Eastwood experience of last week, that's progress!
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