Newark Town 7 – 1 Clay Cross Town

Newark Town 7 – 1 Clay Cross Town
The Blues rounded off an excellent week by polishing off another of their potential promotion rivals with a powerful display. Admittedly Clay Cross were somewhat under strength, but Town’s display on Saturday would have caused problems for any opposition. Lewis Chambers returned after missing the win against Dinnington, partnering Jake Hardy to form a potent strike force.
The first opportunity fell to the visitors on six minutes, a free kick on the penalty area struck wide by Lewis Macaskill. A minute later from another free kick in an almost identical position at the other end Jake Hardy blasted the ball over the wall and past keeper Ryan Hopkins. A second goal was not long in coming. With just 9 minutes on the clock Lewis Chambers seemed to have overrun the ball but managed to get the better of Adam Blakeley before beating Hopkins with an angled shot. Play evened out with both defences having the better of things. Things got worse for the visitors as in the space of five minutes they lost two players suffering from head injuries and were forced into substitutions. A well directed cross from Zak Kersey saw Chambers withing inches of adding to his tally. Town went three up in added time at the end of the first half, Jackson Buckthorpe sending Hardy free on the left, his square ball finding Chambers who expertly turned the covering defender to shhot past Hopkins.
The visitors had a good opportunity to reduce the arrears early in the second half, Josh Parfitt getting a sight of goal but denied by a well judged tackle from Keeper Harry Haywood. Chambers completed his hat trick on 52 minutes, as, collecting a long ball from Jonny Wiles, he sent a perfectly judged lob over the head of the oncoming Hopkins. Despite conceding a number of free kicks in potentially dangerous positions the Blues kept the visitors at bay, Haywood doing well to collect several high balls under pressure. Hardy was replaced by Mark Faflik and it was the substitute who was next on the scoresheet, showing a turn of pace to outstrip his marker before rifling the ball home. He was close to another a couple of minutes later, just failing to connect with another cross. Gabriel Rattigan replaced Jonny Wiles and almost set up Chambers again, Hopkins making a good save at the foot of the post. On 80 minutes a slick one-two between Matty Clarke and Buckthorpe ended with Clarke, at full stretch, poking the ball home for number six. Town’s defence was finally breached on 82 minutes when a cross from sub Tyron Macaskill was backheeled past Haywood by brother Lewis. The final goal came in the 90th minute with the referee spotting an infringement of some kind in the visitors penalty area, Chambers hammering home the spot kick for his fourth of the afternoon.