Familiar scoreline as Blues complete unwanted treble
Leek Town ....................... 0 Atherton Collieries .......... 1
LEEK Town slipped to the their third consecutive 1-0 defeat when Atherton Collieries left Harrison Park with all three points.
Manager Neil Baker made three changes to the side that lost at Runcorn Linnets.
Billy Sass-davies arrived on loan from Crewe Alexandra and he replaced hamstring victim Scott Lycett in the centre of defence.
Tim Grice made his first start since September and Niall Maguire also returned to the starting line-up with Aaron Bott and Billy Reeves dropping down to the bench.
The Colls took the lead in the fourth minute when a ball in from the left found Tom Bentham just inside the box and he was given enough time and space to pick his spot, slotting the ball past Danny Roberts into the bottom corner of the net.
Marc Grocott came close to levelling matters on eight minutes when he made a good incisive run and saw his shot tipped over by Greg Hartley in the Atherton goal.
Colls had a good chance in the 16th minute with a header from a free-kick that went just over the crossbar.
Jordan Johnson had a shot from 20 yards just over and Grice saw a header saved by Hartley, before on the stroke of half-time Rob Stevenson had a run down the left but Grice was unable to turn his cross-shot home.
The Blues continued to see plenty of the ball after the break but rather like their last two games failed to show enough creativity or quality to trouble a resolute and hardworking Atherton side.
Both of Town’s best opportunities fell to Grice – on 56 minutes he glanced a header just wide.
Then with a quarter of an hour remaining, the ball was headed across by Bott and Grice with his back to goal was unlucky when his overhead kick clipped the crossbar.
Leek continued to probe for an equaliser but lacked both the urgency and guile to unlock the visitors wellorganised defence.
BLUES: Roberts, Green, Short, Grocott, Sass-davies, Chadwick, Maguire (Bott 73), Hall (Reeves 54), Grice, Johnson, Stevenson. Unused subs: Walford, Bavanganga, Chapman
BOOKING: Aaron Bott
ATTENDANCE: 336