Hogg

Villa's return to league action after nearly three months produced a very poor performance by their normally high standards, this is to take nothing away from the home side who thoroughly deserved their victory.

The games started badly for the visitors as they were two down within the first seven minutes, after five minutes a cross from the Eagley right flew into the Villa box, the attempted clearance was headed against the cross bar and the ball dropped favourably for the Eagley centre forward to tap home. Two minutes later Villa failed to close down an Eagley forward outside the box, his speculative shot flew into the top corner.

At this point it was all one way traffic as the home side tried to capitalise on their early lead. They achieved this after fifteen minutes, this time a cross shot from the left flew in just under the bar. Villa had their first serious attempt on goal a minute later following good work on the right by Liam Conway, he was able to find Damien Stewart whose low shot was just past the foot of the post.

As the half progressed Villa started to get their passing game going and for the last fifteen minutes of the half they were the better side. They badly needed to pull at least one goal back before the break, put despite their improved play they were unable to breach the home defence.

At the start of the second half Shaun Gibbs was called into early action saving well at the foot of the post. Then Sam Shone did well to beat the offside trap, only to see his shot fly wide. Things got worse after fifty minutes as the home side scored a fourth. Villa continued to try to get back in the match, but this was now proving to be a difficult task.

A Damien Stewart free kick was saved by the keeper and Villa forced a number of corners as the home side were now content to defend their lead. Villa eventually pulled a goal back after seventy minutes when on his debut Danial Hogg scored with a low shot inside the post.

If Villa felt they were getting back on top they suffered a further setback on seventy five minutes when another Eagley shot flew into the top corner.
Things got even worse ten minutes later when a clear Eagley handball was not given by the referee, and as Villa protested, the ball was bungled into the net. In the last few minutes both Matt Conway and Liam Conway came close but by then it was too little too late.

Team   -  Gibbs, C.Chambers, O'Loughlin, Crombie, Winstanley, ( Bowman )
L.Conway, Bradshaw, ( Whewell ) M.Conway, Stewart, Shone, Pillay, ( Hogg )