Jon Leonard was today’s captain against Rothwell Town. This was the first league meeting between Stanley and Rothwell Town and Stanley were keen to win and to close the point’s gap with the current league leaders. The game started brightly for both sides in very frosty conditions with good defending between Brad Bate and Jon. An early attack with good build up play involving James Andrassy and Ben Marsh resulted in a crisp shot from Billy Murtagh going wide. Rothwell pressed early on towards Stanley’s goal but with Jon and Brad tackling hard and Daniel Sheard pressing the Rothwell players in the holding midfield role, Stanley gradually got the upper hand and began to take more control of the first half. From a well defended free kick, Ross Hartley in goal cleared well down the middle of the park for Daniel S to battle well around the centre circle and pass the ball brilliantly onto Billy, who raced through into the penalty area and placed a shot past the keeper for Stanley to take a well deserved 0 – 1 lead. Daniel Bretton came on for Daniel S in defensive midfield but quickly moved to centre forward as Billy came off hurt, with Daniel S back on into midfield. Rothwell pushed late on in the half for an equaliser, but with great defensive tracking back from Ben and James A in midfield, Stanley managed to turn defence into attack, breaking well and threaten Rothwell’s goal on a number of occasions and ended the half on top.

The second half began with an attack from Ben down the right wing following good defending from Brad. The game started to even up with Rothwell pushing forward and Jon making two tackles in midfield before Rothwell got a shot off which was well saved by Ross down to his right. Billy came on for Daniel S, with Daniel B moving back in defensive midfield and Billy going up front. Stanley were mostly defending at this point in the game, but from a clearance from Brad, Ben and Billy combined to force a corner. From the resulting second corner Ben got a shot away which was saved well. Stanley forced another corner which resulted in Billy having a long shot which was again saved. More hard tackling in midfield by Ben to win the ball, who combined with Billy for Ben to shoot into the side netting. Rothwell then had their best chance with a shot heading for the top right hand corner, but this was turned over for a corner with a great save from Ross. This seemed to spur Stanley on and resulted in a shot from James A being saved, Ben shot narrowly wide and then went on a long run to play Billy through on goal who scored Stanley’s second goal. Being two goals up Stanley began to take charge again with good work in defence from Ross, Brad and Jon who broke up any attack getting the ball into the hard working midfield of Daniel B, Ben and James A through to Billy in attack.

The final whistle gave Stanley a 2 -0 victory to cap a hard gritty all round performance. In summary this was probably the best team performance to date.

The Revive Mobile Car Body Repair Player of the Match Award went to Ben Marsh for his all round game of defending, tackling, dribbling, passing and attacking.