Comfortable home win for Alfreton Town over Bradford Park Avenue

Delighted manager Billy Heath praised the character and hard work ethic of his players after Alfreton Town demolished Bradford Park Avenue 4-0 — their first win over the West Yorkshire side since 2005.
Alfreton's Amari Morgan-Smith fires in the penalty.Alfreton's Amari Morgan-Smith fires in the penalty.
Alfreton's Amari Morgan-Smith fires in the penalty.

“l think the fans have seen the difference in direction this season,” said Heath.

“They’re a tight-knit group, they look out for each other and that’s vital — you can’t win games of football if you don’t work hard.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“Even with a 2-0 lead at half-time we told the players to go out for the first 15 minutes of the second half and out-work them again.”

Amari Morgan-Smith led the way with a brace, the first goal an absolute gift on 12 minutes when a poor back-pass let in the grateful striker, who then rounded keeper Rhys Taylor to score.

After two unsuccessful penalty appeals the referee finally pointed to the spot when Morgan-Smith was brought down by Jon Moran in the 39th minute, before crashing home his second goal of the afternoon from the 12-yard mark.

The hapless Moran also contributed to Alfreton’s third goal 12 minutes after the break, another poor back-pass allowing Danny Clarke to stroke the loose ball home.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Then it was the turn of defender Ben Hedley to assist the Reds when he turned Josh Wilde’s 74th minute cross past his own keeper.

Bradford kept going and home keeper Jack Atkinson, a former Park Avenue player, needed to palm the ball against the crossbar as Lewis Knight hammered a shot towards goal three minutes from time, but generally they had posed little threat throughout.

Heath added: “We had a lot of tired legs from Tuesday — the schedule at the beginning of the season is tough, when you’ve got a small squad.

“Before we got the first goal we looked a little bit jaded. We expected that, after putting so much effort in on Tuesday night against Alty — we didn’t do a great deal on Thursday [training] as we had a few struggling.”

Related topics: