Young team drop to 2-0- defeat at Walsall
Walsall 2 Shrewsbury Town 0
Tuesday 1st April 2014
Final Third Development League
Town: 1 - Callum Burton, 2 - Ryan Hickman (14 - George Carpenter 70), 3 - Ben Burton, 4 - Dom Smith, 5 - Jeff Watkins, 6 - Alex Fletcher, 7 - Dave Easthope (15 - Matthew Jones 75), 8 - Niall Flint, 9 - Tom Bradshaw (16 - Scott Ryan 80), 10 - Kaimen Anderson, 11 - Josh Ginnelly
Subs: 12 - Sam Molyneux, 13 - Alex Ashton
Played at The Scholars Stadium home of Chasetown, Shrewsbury took the field with a team made up of predominantly first year scholars plus the inclusion of Tom Bradshaw on his way back from injury.
The first half saw Town shade possession after a shaky start, chances were created from both flanks with good forward play from Ginnelly and Burton down the left and Easthope and Hickman from the right. Bradshaw came close to opening the scoring with a glancing header midway through the first half.
Shrewsbury couldn't capitalise on their possession and an uncharacteristic error by the Town midfield saw the Walsall front man fire past Burton from fully 20 yards.
Half Time: Walsall 1 Shrewsbury Town 0
Town started the second half in much the same way trying to build play through the defending and middle thirds and again the wide play of Easthope and Ginnelly continued to cause Walsall problems and it was Ginnelly who supplied a through ball for Bradshaw to cut inside and shoot narrowly wide midway through the half. Walsall's second goal came from the penalty spot following what looked like a perfectly good tackle by Ben Burton; Callum Burton was given no chance from the spot as the ball was placed low into his bottom right hand corner.
Full Time: Walsall 2 Shrewsbury Town 0
'All in all a pleasing performance with plenty of positives to take forward into the next game'
Steve Reece