Two goals in five second-half minutes from Chris Porter and captain Luke Murphy saw Crewe Alexandra defeat fellow relegation-battlers Morecambe at the Globe Arena last night, a result that saw the Railwaymen move off the bottom of League 1 into 22nd place.
Manager David Artell made two changes from Tuesday’s 2-0 defeat against Sheffield Wednesday with Murphy and Mika Mandron coming into the team for Regan Griffiths and Scott Robertson, the latter dropping to the bench. Former Alex loanee Greg Leigh would start for the hosts.
The opening chance of the game came in the 5th minute with Adebisi shooting into the side netting before Aaron Wildig’s effort for the hosts would balloon wide minutes later. Morecambe would take the lead 9 minutes before the break with Leigh heading in a right-sided cross into Dave Richards’ bottom corner.
The Alex would equalise 7 minutes into the second half with Callum Ainley’s cross headed into the same corner of the net before the turnaround was completed 5 minutes later with Murphy chesting the ball and lifting it into the top corner, his first Alex goal since the final game of his first spell back in 2013. Mandron would be denied by Kyle Letheren in the Shrimps’ goal before Richards would save an effort from Jonah Ayunga as the Alex would hold on for their first away win of the season.
Our next couple of games sees the Alex travel to Burton Albion on Saturday before hosting Rotherham United in the EFL Trophy next Tuesday.
What can we take out of this game?
This was a very important result, especially with them missing the league’s top-scorer Cole Stockton from the game, which keeps the Alex close to the teams just outside the relegation spots (even if Lincoln have a game in hand over everyone else).
One thing that I’d like to see is one of the two right (wing-)backs return to the team now they are fit and Kayne Ramsay will probably be the man who will do that, starting with the Burton game.
Globe Arena
League 1
29/12/2021 8:45 pm
Attendance: 3831
Referee: Seb Stockbridge
| Morecambe | Crewe Alexandra | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leigh | Porter, Murphy | ||||||
| Letheren | Richards | ||||||
| McLaughlin | Offord | ||||||
| Gibson | Sass-Davies | ||||||
| O'Connor | Williams | ||||||
| Jones | Ainley | 77 | |||||
| Leigh | Lowery | ||||||
| Wildig | 70 | Murphy | |||||
| Phillips | 48 | Finney | 85 | ||||
| McLoughlin | Adebisi | 52 | |||||
| Obika | 68 | Porter | |||||
| Ayunga | Mandron | ||||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Andresson | Jaaskelainen | ||||||
| McDonald | 70 | Ramsay | 52 | ||||
| Diagouraga | 48 | Gomes | |||||
| Delaney | Daniels | ||||||
| Mensah | Johnson | 77 | |||||
| Gnahoua | 68 | O'Riordan | |||||
| Harrison | Robertson | 85 | |||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 16 | Goal attempts | 7 |
| 3 | On Target | 2 |
| 7 | Corners | 5 |
| 10 | Fouls | 9 |
| 0 | Yellow Cards | 2 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 43 | % | 57 |