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Wrexham bounced back from Tuesday night’s disappointing defeat at Wycombe with a crucial victory at home. This was branded as a ‘must win’ game by many, but a tough one nevertheless. Bury have pulled away from the relegation battle with a good run of form under new management recently.

Neil Taylor continued in midfield from the other night, as did Gareth Evans in central defence. Sam Aiston also started with Mike Williams on the bench and Richard Hope left out of the squad.

Bury edged the opening as Evans and Ward failed to communicate with each other but nothing came from their set-pieces. The game became fairly even as it settled down, but there was a tense atmosphere among the home crowd wit the knowledge of what was at stake.

With just over 20 minutes gone a chance was set-up for Bury’s lethal striker Andy Bishop. From close-range his shot was stopped superbly by Gavin Ward to keep us level. That scare seemed to inspire us just a few minutes later.

Having dealt with a Bury corner Sam Aiston picked the ball up and ran from his own penalty area to Bury’s area with no Shakers player able to keep up with him. He fired a shot at goal which was kept out by goalkeeper Randolph only to fall to Drewe Broughton. The loan striker made no mistake from close-range as he finally opened his Wrexham scoring account after 10 games of waiting.

Ward had to be alert again as straight away Bury created another chance for Bishop. As half-time approached Ward was forced into another good save from an Elliott Bennett strike. Before the corner was taken Carl Tremarco had to leave the field due to injury. He was replaced by Mike Williams.

From a long clearance Broughton controlled the ball on his chest, turning to smash it against the Bury bar. That looked to be the last action of the half but deep into the stoppage time added on for Tremarco’s injury Bury won a free-kick. Swung into the area Glynn Hurst headed home with our defence static.

That equaliser was a cruel way to end the half and our dreadful luck with injuries continued. Having had an outstanding game in central midfield Neil Taylor had to be replaced by Matt Done following a long-spell out of the first-team.

Bury had more of the ball during the second half but when we did get to push forward Hall, Aiston and Broughton linked up well. We were let off the hook with 20 minutes to go, Bury having a well-worked goal ruled offside.

Stuart Nicholson replaced the tiring Hall with quarter of an hour to go. The change proved a masterstroke as within minutes he combined well with Spender out on the right. Spender, deservedly named Man of the Match, put in a low cross which was despatched by in-form striker Mike Proctor. A huge surge of relief spread around the Racecourse!

It could have been a nervy last ten minutes but we had more of the ball creating more close chances for Proctor and Nicholson. Deep into another lengthy period of stoppage time Bury had one last opportunity eventually collected by Ward before the final whistle.

The result was more important than the performance as shown by the reaction of the home fans at the end. The result was even more important given that other results didn’t go our way.

Next week we travel to Brentford as we approach a busy Easter period. Despite the mounting injury list featuring many key players, as long as unsung heroes like Spender and Bolland at the back are on top of their game, we have a chance.

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Wrexham twice shot themselves in the foot at Wycombe on a night which saw the gap between our current position and safety widen again. Brian Little kept faith in the side that won at Chester just two days prior to this game.

We failed to get off to the best of starts as the wind wreaked havoc with Gavin Ward’s goal-kicks. It was on quarter of an hour when he was first caught out. One of his kicks went straight to Leon Knight who made no mistake in despatching such a great opportunity.

Wycombe kept the pressure on with the wind in their favour and doubled the lead just over five minutes later. Another Ward goal-kick only made it as far as Carl Tremarco. In a rare moment of misjudgement for the usually assured left-back he headed the ball back towards Ward. This time it was the prolific Scott McGleish taking advantage of the gift-wrapped opportunity, rounding Ward to make it 2-0.

Unfortunately we offered little in terms of a comeback going forward and looked liable to concede further soft goals at the back. Before the end of the half McGleish had struck the crossbar when he should have scored.

Just before the interval we lost Jeff Whitley to a knee injury as the night went from bad to worse. He was replaced by Sam Aiston but this was not the only change Brian Little had in mind.

In a fairly radical move he put Neil Taylor on in place of Phil Bolland, the left-sided youngster moving into midfield. Young centre-half Gareth Evans, back from a curtailed loan spell at Tamworth, also came on in place of the struggling Richard Hope.

The gamble paid off as we reverted to 4-3-3 and won a number of set-pieces from the re-start. From one of them, on 52 minutes, we scored. A free-kick on the half-way line resulted in Tremarco’s cross being headed by Gaz Evans for Michael Proctor to slot home 10 yards out.

The goal lifted the spirit of the players and travelling Wrexham fans as we continued to press on. Wycombe were clearly rattled, introducing more defensive players to cope with our onslaught though they still threatened on the break.

With just over 10 minutes to go Chairboys midfielder Tommy Doherty was red-carded for cynically clipping Aiston just outside the area. Aiston had caused real problems with his pace and trickery since he was introduced, it was just unfortunate the end product wasn’t quite there

We came close in the dying minutes as Paul Hall created a chance for himself which was tipped over the bar. It wasn’t to be, and we were left to rue the two mistakes that gave us a near impossible mountain to climb so early on in the game.

We can take heart from the second-half performance. However some of our defending in the first half was all too similar to the frequent mistakes we seemed to have put behind us recently.

There are plenty of positives and negatives to take from this game but, despite it being close, ultimately we didn’t pick up any points on a night when others did. The season has many twists and turns to go yet, let’s just hope things go in our favour at home to Bury on Saturday.

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