A second-half brace from Courtney Baker-Richardson helped Crewe Alexandra to come from behind to defeat Forest Green Rovers at the New Lawn yesterday.
Manager Lee Bell made 7 changes from Tuesday’s 1-0 defeat at Port Vale in the EFL Trophy as Harvey Davies, Rio Adebisi, Luke Offord, Joel Tabiner, Jack Powell, Chris Long and Baker-Richardson all came into the team with Tom Booth, Ryan Cooney, Charlie Finney, Owen Lunt, Elliott Nevitt and Joe White all dropping down to the bench and Lewis Billington, who wasn’t involved. Former Alex loanee Sean Robertson was not involved for the hosts.
The opening chance of the game went the hosts’ way in the 4th minute with Matty Taylor forcing a save from Davies before Conor Thomas would have an effort saved at the other end on 18 minutes. The next chance would fall to Baker-Richardson who would hit the bar with a header from an Aaron Rowe cross before Reece Brown opened the scoring for the hosts 10 minutes before the break, an inswinging corner wasn’t dealt with as the midfielder would score from 6 yards out.
After a half-time change that saw the unwell Rowe replaced by Cooney, the Alex would level 5 minutes into the second period as a defensive mistake was pounced on by Long with the forward bursting through the defence before slotting past Luke Daniels in the hosts’ goal with the Alex taking the lead on the hour as Baker-Richardson headed in an inswinging corner from Joel Tabiner.
The third came in the 69th minute, a free-kick was nodded down by Mickey Demetriou with CBR smashing the ball into the bottom corner with the fourth coming with 8 minutes to play as substitute Nevitt turned in a left-sided cross from Long.
The next couple of games see the Alex travelling to AFC Wimbledon next Saturday before hosting Colchester United the following Saturday.
Final Thoughts:
We got exactly what we deserved out of the game after a dominating display (even in the first half). Another soft goal for the opposition as there were a couple of opportunities to deal with the cross that came in but the second half saw a ruthlessness in the finishing as all 4 shots on target resulted in the 4 goals.
The New Lawn
League 2
9/09/2023 4:00 pm
Attendance: 1855
Referee: Thomas Parsons
| Forest Green Rovers | Crewe Alexandra | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brown | Long, Baker-Richardson (2), Nevitt | ||||||
| Daniels | Davies | ||||||
| Bernard | Adebisi | 76 | |||||
| Inniss | O'Riordan | ||||||
| Welch | Offord | ||||||
| Robson | Demetriou | ||||||
| McAllister | Thomas | ||||||
| Bunker | 73 | Powell | 76 | ||||
| Brown | 54 | Rowe | 46 | ||||
| Kadji | 54 | Tabiner | 63 | ||||
| Taylor | 73 | Long | |||||
| Deeney | 73 | Baker-Richardson | 76 | ||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Searle | Booth | ||||||
| Johnson | 54 | Cooney | 46 | ||||
| Jenks | 73 | Williams | 76 | ||||
| Stevens | 73 | Lunt | 76 | ||||
| Bendle | Nevitt | 76 | |||||
| Omotoye | 73 | Finney | |||||
| Dabo | 54 | White | 63 | ||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 9 | Goal attempts | 18 |
| 4 | On Target | 5 |
| 3 | Corners | 7 |
| 12 | Fouls | 10 |
| 3 | Yellow Cards | 3 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 56 | % | 44 |