Staffordshire Senior League

Rocester Reserves 1 Wolstanton United 1

Reigning league champions Wolstanton United came to Hillsfield in search of three points that would keep them hot on the heels of Hanley Town at the top of the table, but they had to be content with just one point from a hard-earned draw against the battling Romans.

The Potteries side started well, and Karl Smith (pictured) had to make a fine double-save in the first few minutes to keep them out.

Smith was in action again in the 9th minute to block another shot as Wolstanton kept up their bright start, but Rocester soon began to get into the game and enjoyed some good spells of possession.

Rocester found it difficult to create many openings against a big, well-organised defence, and it was the visitors who came closest to scoring in the first half. They were, however, denied by another good save from Smith who reacted quickly to tip a Mark Grice shot over the bar.

Six minutes into the second half it was Rocester who finally broke the deadlock. Colin Fletcher chased a nicely-weighted ball down the left before crossing perfectly to Adam McMahon, and he squeezed the ball past the keeper into the net from six yards.

Mark Grice equalised in the 59th minute for the visitors, though whether he was on or offside was open to debate. Certainly most of the crowd at that end and the Rocester players felt he was offside as he chased after a long ball over the defence, but the flag didn't go up and although Smith nearly managed to grab the ball at the striker's feet Grice tucked it into the net.

Ben Henderson saw his header from Gavin Reynolds' free kick well saved, and then in the 70th minute Wolstanton were reduced to ten men when their No.5 was sent off for violent conduct following an incident that was spotted by one of the Assistant Referees.

Wolstanton were still dangerous opponents even with a man down, and defensively they were in no mood to let Rocester grab a win. They were quite cynical in their approach whenever Rocester had the ball, breaking play up with some lunging tackles which earned them three yellow cards in the closing stages.

Neither side could find a winning goal, and the draw was just about a fair reflection of the game.

Manager Steve Swanwick was again very happy with his team's performance, and singled out goalkeeper Karl Smith for some praise.

"Karl was excellent, he made some really good saves and kept us in the game early on, he was definitely our Man-of-the-Match." He said.

"Once we had weathered the storm in the first 20 minutes or so we steadily improved and got back in it, we were probably the happier of the two teams at half time."

"They are a decent side but we competed well with them. Mark Thompson did a good job on their centre forward Mark Grice who is the league's top scorer, and all the lads worked tremendously hard for each other."

"It's really hard for us to make changes at the moment because everyone is doing so well. We have made a few tactical changes but they have had nothing to do with individual performances." He added.

Romans: Karl Smith; Matt Jackson (Phil Bull 45); Aaron Plant; Richard Owen; Mark Thompson; Ben Henderson; Liam Sowter; Gavin Reynolds; Adam McMahon; Colin Fletcher; Shaun Coates (Jon Lamburn 80).