Owen Dale’s 8th goal of the season saw Crewe Alexandra defeat Shrewsbury Town at the New Meadow last night, a result that sees the visitors sit outside the play-off spots on goal difference.
Manager David Artell made 3 changes from Saturday’s 1-1 draw against Ipswich Town as Travis Johnson replaced Billy Jones at right-back while Dale and Daniel Powell came in for Stephen Walker and Charlie Kirk as part of the front 3. Former Alex striker Daniel Udoh started for the hosts.
The opening chance of the game came in the opening minute as Harry Chapman’s chip went into the side-netting before the first Alex chance came 15 minutes later with Powell forcing Matija Sarkic into a save. The Alex took the lead in the 27th minute as Johnson’s cross was turned in at the back post by Dale.
The second-half saw Shaun Whalley have an effort saved by Dave Richards early in the half before wing-back Nathanael Ogbeta also bringing a save out of the Welshman. Despite the Alex sitting back, they held on for the win, as we have only had one defeat in 13 games.
The next games for the Alex see a trip to Peterborough United on Saturday before hosting Portsmouth the following Saturday.
What can we take out of this game?
It’s a game that shows our resilience that we have acquired until Artell’s management where we would have found a way of conceding and possibly going on to lose that game under the previous management. Once again, it was the defensive players that were the most noticeable players (including Richards) with Johnson showing that he could be the one that will take the place as Perry Ng’s replacement in the right-back position.
New Meadow
League 1
2/02/2021 8:00 pm
Attendance: 0
Referee: Marc Edwards
| Shrewsbury Town | Crewe Alexandra | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dale | |||||||
| Sarkic | Richards | ||||||
| Sears | 57 | Johnson | |||||
| Williams | 89 | Lancashire | |||||
| Ebanks-Landell | Beckles | ||||||
| Pierre | Pickering | ||||||
| Ogbeta | Murphy | ||||||
| Norburn | Wintle | ||||||
| Chapman | Finney | 79 | |||||
| Vela | Dale | ||||||
| Whalley | Mandron | 90 | |||||
| Udoh | 77 | Powell | 77 | ||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Burgoyne | Jaaskelainen | ||||||
| Golbourne | Lowery | 79 | |||||
| Edwards | Porter | 90 | |||||
| Goss | Kirk | ||||||
| Pyke | 89 | Adebisi | |||||
| Daniels | 57 | Walker | 77 | ||||
| Davis | 77 | Evans | |||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 16 | Goal attempts | 6 |
| 4 | On Target | 4 |
| 5 | Corners | 2 |
| 18 | Fouls | 10 |
| 2 | Yellow Cards | 3 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 54 | % | 46 |