A second-half penalty save from Will Jaaskelainen saw Crewe Alexandra get a goalless draw with Portsmouth at the Alexandra Stadium last night.
Manager David Artell made six changes from Saturday’s 6-0 home defeat against Oxford United with Rio Adebisi, Nathan Wood and Luke Offord all coming into the defence, Tom Lowery and Antony Evans came into the midfield with Chris Porter starting up front alongside Owen Dale as we changed to a 4-4-2 from the usual 4-3-3. Dropping down to the bench were Donervon Daniels, Callum Ainley, Mika Mandron, Olly Lancashire and Omar Beckles while Ryan Wintle missed out on the matchday 18 completely.
The opening chance of the game came in the 22nd minute with Lowery heading an Evans cross wide of the goal before the Paderborn loanee had a free-kick that took a deflection 11 minutes later. Jaaskelainen would produce a decent save to deny Jack Whatmough in stoppage-time in the first half.
Dale would be the next to have a shot for the hosts after Pompey captain Tom Naylor was dispossessed by Porter, the forward shooting straight at Craig MacGillvary before the visitors won a penalty on 58 minutes. A mix-up between Offord and Jaaskelainen saw the goalkeeper bring down the attacker with him making amends with a save down to his left from a poor penalty from John Marquis, his second penalty save in as many games.
The next games for the Alex see us travel to Wigan Athletic on Saturday before another trip to Lancashire to face Fleetwood Town next Tuesday.
What can we take out of this game?
After Saturday’s drubbing at the hands of Oxford, it was important to put in a performance that was a reaction to that game and get back on track to finish as high in the table as possible in our first season back at this level. Defensively we were better, for the most part, aside from the penalty incident and restricted a top-6 team to few clear-cut chances which were dealt with well by Jaaskelainen when he was called upon to use his gloves.
Alexandra Stadium
League 1
13/04/2021 7:00 pm
Attendance: 0
Referee: Darren Drysdale
| Crewe Alexandra | Portsmouth | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jaaskelainen | MacGillivray | ||||||
| Adebisi | 31 | Johnson | |||||
| Wood | Whatmough | ||||||
| Offord | Raggett | ||||||
| Pickering | Daniels | ||||||
| Evans | Naylor | ||||||
| Lowery | Close | 72 | |||||
| Murphy | Harness | ||||||
| Kirk | 61 | Williams | 74 | ||||
| Porter | Curtis | ||||||
| Dale | Marquis | ||||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Richards | Ward | ||||||
| Daniels | 31 | Bolton | |||||
| Ainley | Cannon | ||||||
| Mandron | 61 | Nicolaisen | |||||
| Lancashire | Byers | 74 | |||||
| Beckles | White | 72 | |||||
| Walker | Stanley | ||||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 9 | Goal attempts | 12 |
| 1 | On Target | 5 |
| 2 | Corners | 6 |
| 18 | Fouls | 9 |
| 2 | Yellow Cards | 2 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 39 | % | 61 |