Toolstation NCEL Division One
Hall Road Rangers 1-3 AFC Emley
AFC Emley celebrate one of their three goals at Hall Road. Picture: Mark Parsons
AFC Emley secured an assured triumph over Hall Road Rangers in their second visit to Humberside over the course of a few days.
Goals from Liam Schofield, Ash Flynn and Jordan Townsend, all in quick succession in the second half, looked to confirm another three points away from home, despite Hall Road’s attempt to lodge a late comeback.
Darren Hepworth’s side fell victim to a very early goal at the Westella on Wednesday and they nearly met the same fate at Haworth Park on Saturday when Emley went into panic stations as the hosts hit the crossbar from a corner in the opening couple of minutes.
Similar to events in Wednesday night’s match, Emley had a very friendly afternoon with the woodwork of Steve Janney’s goal. Jordan Coduri was the first to come into contact with the framework – his low drive couldn’t quite worm its way past the outstretching goalkeeper and into the bottom corner.
Emley’s early wake-up call seemed to do them the world of good as their performance peaked ever since. Flynn was next up to chance his arm on goal, but when he went one-on-one with the goalkeeper, the latter prevailed, much to the surprise of the 90 in attendance.
Then, Aaron Joseph was left pondering how he hadn’t opened the scoring after a dreadful piece of defending presented a glorious opportunity for the midfielder to score into an empty net from ten yards out.
Somehow, Hall Road escaped courtesy of a last-ditch goal-line clearance. Emley may have scored all of their goals in the first half against Westella, but they were saving the scoring until the second half on Saturday.
The deadlock was broken in unorthodox circumstances by Schofield, whose seemingly unthreatening free-kick was disastrously dropped over the line by Steve Janney in the Hall Road goal.
Flynn followed on from his brace during the week and bundled the ball in to take his league goal scoring tally up to eight for the season just minutes after the opener.
Then, the curtain seemed to drop on the match when Townsend slotted home from close range to finish off the goal of the game after a magnificent counter-attack, which stemmed from a Hall Road corner.
The hosts did, however, manage to claw their way back into the game with about 25 minutes on the clock when Gary Stevens uncharacteristically spilled the ball in the six yard area and put it on a platter for Chris Spinks to smash it into the bottom corner.
In the closing stages, Tom Brennan’s header crashed off the crossbar before Townend’s cross took a wicked swerve and hit the same mark. Despite Emley’s best efforts to add a fourth, they were happy with a comfortable 3-1 win over a Hall Road side, who have begun their season in fine form.
Thanks to Luke Greaves for this report.