Pinchbeck United 1
Raunds Town 0
Tom Sergeant’s first-half strike earned Pinchbeck United a key 1-0 win over title rivals Raunds Town on Saturday – and saw then build up a huge ten-point lead at the top of the ChromaSport UCL Division One table.
In what was a largely drab clash on a Sir Halley Stewart Playing Field surface that more resembled a ploughed field than a football pitch due to the overnight rain, the Knights were value for their win.
The all-important moment came on 28 minutes, with Sergeant collecting a raking pass from Tyler Wright, cutting inside a defender and wrong-footing the visiting keeper with his clever finish.
Knowing they had a seven-point cushion over their rivals, Pinchbeck sat on their lead from then off and restricted Raunds to few chances.
With just 11 games left, Knights number to Allan Ross made no apologies for the defensive nature of the table-toppers’ second-half tactics and admitted he wants his side to wrap up the title as soon as possible.
“To be ten points clear is amazing,” said the assistant boss. “It’s where we want to be – but we would never have said at the start of the season that we could be in this position.
“But we believed in our ability and we believe in the boys. It’s a great position for us to be in and we’re just ticking the games off now.
“I’m not sure we’re even able to enjoy it as management, it’s just about ticking them off.
“The quicker we win this league, the better for all of us! We couldn’t lose today, that was very important. We would have been happy with a draw, but it was a case of ‘don’t lose’.
“We heard a few negative comments about our gameplan. But, from half-time, we decided to let them come on to us and then hit them on the break.
“Good football doesn’t win leagues at this level, especially playing on that kind of surface today.
“So let’s not be naïve, we knew they were going to come at us. Raunds are a fantastic team with some very good footballers and have a very good set-up.
“We knew that they had to chase the game, so we decided to sit tight and not let them play through us. Possession football wasn’t going to work on a day like this.”
Pinchbeck came flying out of the blocks at a very wet Sir Halley, registering three shots on goal in the first few minutes.
Top scorer Ollie Maltby fired a speculative effort wide inside the first few seconds, while Andrew Tidswell picked out a great pass for Sergeant to lob straight at the keeper.
Left-back Wright then half-volleyed a long-range strike just over as the Knights settled superbly.
However, the visitors soon had a golden opportunity to go ahead when Ty Clark latched onto a slip from Jack Smith and raced clear, only for Dan Swan to expertly deny him with a low one-handed stop.
The breakthrough did go Pinchbeck’s way on 28 minutes, though. Keeper Swan showed clever improvisation to head the ball to Wright, who in turn sent a lovely long pass over for Sergeant to control, cut inside and fire past the keeper.
It was very nearly 2-0 five minutes before the interval, as Chris Shipley rose to nod home a Tidswell free-kick at the back post – but it was ruled out at the back post.
The hosts did have Swan to thank for their half-time lead, though, with the keeper acrobatically tipping Clark’s curling effort past his far post in the closing stages of the period.
With heavy rain falling in the second half, the playing surface became even harder for the two teams to negotiate.
Tidswell lashed a long-ranger just wide and Sergeant saw a low drive saved at the near post as the Knights searched for a second.
But the hosts focused more on defending their lead than adding to it, defending in numbers and giving a lively Raunds attack few sights of goal.
When they did fashion an opening seven minutes from time, Swan was at full stretch to turn Mason Thomas’ accurate header past the post.
That seemed to give Pinchbeck additional motivation to wrap up the three points, with both Josh Smith and Maltby seeing close-range efforts blocked when perhaps they should have done better.
Nick Bishop certainly should have done better with virtually the last kick of the game, but he somehow placed an effort wide from even closer in with the keeper beaten and the goal gaping.
Raunds did have a late strike ruled out for offside, but the Knights were just about value for their win – and they will now take some stopping in what increasingly looks like a one-horse race for the title.
Player/boss Ian Dunn concedes that his charges have to be considered “odds-on” to win the title, but stopped short of saying the job was already done.
He added: “Do I think we have one hand on the trophy? No, not really. You can always get two or three injuries or suspensions or have bad refereeing decisions going against you.
“We’ve still got some tough games to come and big teams to face. We’d love to go unbeaten until the rest of the season, which we could possibly do if we carry on doing what we’re doing.
“But there’s always that performance – like against Bourne or Huntingdon – there to remind us that we could slip up.
“You’ve got to be realistic. Yes, it’s a fantastic lead and it’d be easy to say we’ve got one hand on the trophy.
“I think it’s ours to lose and the Bookies would have us odds-on. But there’s still a long way to go – the other teams will, quite rightly, want to come and beat us.
“If we make a big statement and say we’ve got one hand on the trophy, the players can easily take things for granted and we could go to Corby next week and slip up, because we’re not at the races.
“It’s important that we stay focused on what our goal is and not let our concentration slip by thinking that the job’s done, because it isn’t.”
Pinchbeck: Swan, Gordon, Wright, Tidwell, Jack Smith, Brooks, Eyett (Josh Smith 79), Shipley, Sergeant (Bishop 84), Maltby, Murrell. Not used: Buzas, Dunn.
Attendance: 92.
