Tom Lowery’s late goal saw Crewe Alexandra draw in their final home game of the season against mid-table Ipswich Town at the Alexandra Stadium yesterday.
Manager Alex Morris made 3 changes to the starting 11 from Tuesday’s 1-0 defeat at Sheffield Wednesday with on-loan Arsenal defender Ryan Alebiosu starting at right-back, captain Luke Murphy and Tariq Uwakwe also coming into the team – out went Scott Kashket to the bench, Josh Lundstram and Rekeem Harper, the latter ineligible against his parent club.
The opening chance came in the 5th minute with James Norwood having an effort blocked for the visitors before the first Alex chance came on 35 minutes with Callum Ainley’s shot saved by Christian Walton. The opening goal of the game came in stoppage-time with Conor Chaplin’s effort ending up in the bottom corner.
Into the second half as a Mika Mandron header forcing Walton into a decent save in the 58th minute before the Alex equalised with 5 minutes to play as Mandron’s hold-up play would see Lowery arrive onto the ball and drive into the top corner.
The final game sees a trip to Lincoln City next Saturday.
What can we take out of this game?
Just a case really of playing this one out as preparation for next season, with Morris having a look at Alebiosu back in the team (maybe he’s someone that we can get another loan spell for at least part of next season) as well as playing with Uwakwe further forward in a position on the wing, somewhere that he’s more likely to play than full-back next season assuming that Rio Adebisi stays fit a little more often than he has this season.