Calum Agius’ first senior goal saw Crewe Alexandra defeat Harrogate Town in their final EFL Trophy group game at the Alexandra Stadium last night, a result that sees the Alex into the knock-out stages of the competition.
Manager Lee Bell made 9 changes from Saturday’s 2-0 home win against Gillingham as Tom Booth, Stan Dancey (for his first professional start), Lewis Billington, Owen Lunt, scholar Owen Taylor for his first team debut, Matus Holicek, Fin Roberts, Adrien Thibalt and Calum Agius came in for Filip Marschall, James Connolly, Jamie Knight-Lebel, Mickey Demetriou, Joel Tabiner, Kian Breckin, Zac Williams, Shilow Tracey and Jack Lankester were all not involved. Ryan Cooney captained the team while scholars Mikolaj Lenarcik, Luca Moore, Oliver Armstrong, Will Perry and Joe Collins joined first-year pro Lucas Sant on the bench.
The opening chance came in the 18th minute as Max Conway would win a free-kick on the edge of the D then hit the wall with the resulting set-piece before the Alex would miss the target 6 minutes later as Thibalt’s through-ball was smashed over by Agius. Harrogate’s first effort came on 26 minutes with a long-range shot from Josh March was easily saved by Booth before the Alex number 1 would save Levi Sutton’s deflected shot a couple of minutes later.
The Alex took the lead on the half-hour mark as Lunt’s low pass into the area from the right found Thibalt with Agius side-footing the ball in from the edge of the penalty area with his left foot before Lunt would test Mark Oxley with an effort from the edge of the area in the 38th minute which the keeper tipped behind for a corner. The keeper would also deny Roberts a couple of minutes from the break, the forward heading a Dancey cross goalwards with the experienced stopper keeping it out with a strong left hand.
After a half-time double change that saw Ryan Cooney and Max Conway replaced by Sant and debutant Armstrong, Agius would force Oxley to concede another corner by tipping the young Welshman’s effort around the post before Harrogate left-back Zico Asare missed the target in the 69th minute. Booth would have to turn the ball over the bar in the 78th minute from Jasper Moon’s header before Roberts curled a 30-yard free-kick over Oxley’s bar 4 minutes later. Substitute Ellis Taylor would hit the base of the post with a stoppage-time 25-yard free-kick
The next games for the Alex see them travel to Doncaster Rovers on Saturday before hosting Salford City the following Saturday.
Final Thoughts:
That was a good performance that saw the Alex youngsters grow into the game as it went on.
There were plenty of positives to take out of the game – 5 academy players made debuts here [Moore, Perry and Collins also coming off the bench] while others also got some important game time in the first team (perhaps ahead of some being loaned out into non-league football) with Agius scoring with a really composed finish.
Alexandra Stadium
EFL Trophy
8/10/2024 7:45 pm
Attendance: 780
Referee: James Oldham
| Crewe Alexandra | Harrogate Town | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Agius | |||||||
| Booth | Oxley | ||||||
| Dancey | Sims | ||||||
| Cooney (c) | 46 | Burrell | |||||
| Billington | Moon | ||||||
| Conway | 46 | Asare | |||||
| Lunt | Cornelius | ||||||
| Taylor | Sutton | 69 | |||||
| Holicek | 56 | Falkingham (c) | |||||
| Roberts | Robinson | 61 | |||||
| Thibalt | 56 | March | |||||
| Agius | 65 | Daly | 61 | ||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Lenarcik | Belshaw | ||||||
| Sant | 46 | Folarin | |||||
| Moore | 56 | O'Connor | |||||
| Armstrong | 46 | Muldoon | 61 | ||||
| Perry | 56 | Taylor | 61 | ||||
| Collins | 65 | Bray | 69 | ||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 11 | Goal attempts | 10 |
| 4 | On Target | 2 |
| 3 | Corners | 2 |
| 15 | Fouls | 13 |
| 0 | Yellow Cards | 0 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 48 | % | 52 |