Slough warm fans’ hearts on bitterly cold night in Bath
Player/manager Davies scores stunning free kick to seal impressive win over Romans
On a bitterly cold evening, Slough Town fans travelled back along the M4 to Berkshire with a warm glow in their hearts after goals from Slavi Spasov and Scott Davies earned the Rebels a hugely significant victory over Bath City.
The Rebels came, saw, and conquered the Romans at Twerton Park for their sixth league win in nine matches, a run of form that’s propelled them up the National League South table and supporters dreaming of a late charge for the play-offs.
That may be far from player manager Scott
Davies’ mind at present, as he looks to take each game as it comes and build on what’s been a hugely encouraging few months.
However, he must also be starting to wonder what this committed and talented young side is capable of with the Rebels having now put together a run of form that’s the envy of most sides in the division.
The Bulgarian Spasov fired the visitors in front before half-time after Will Buse spilled a low cross from Munashe Sundire, but the Romans fought back after the break with Jordan Thomas grabbing
Bath’s equaliser after a promising start to the second half. However, all their hard work was scrubbed out in an instant with a flick of Davies’ right boot as he curled home another beautiful freekick – to add to his collection this season – to make it 2-1 just before the hour mark.
The visitors then held on for a victory that lifts them to 13th in the table and within five points of the play-off spots with matches in hand over the teams above them. Surely, now they can reassess their goals from staying in the division, to potentially trying to get out of it via promotion.
Speaking to Connor McNeish for
Sloughtownfc.net after the game, a delighted Davies said: “I think that’s up there with my best results as a manager. It’s a result that I’m really proud of. Bath are a really good side. I hate coming here, not because I don’t like the people or the place. I think I’ve been here with different clubs over the past nine years and haven’t won a game, certainly, I’ve never had an easy game here.
“I was thinking this morning it might be a tough game and thought we could come out on the wrong end of things if we didn’t perform to our maximum. We went a bit more direct and played with three centre halves. We tried to press as much as we could, and I think it worked really well for the first goal. I and Munashe went in areas of the pitch where we wouldn’t normally go and Slavi got on the end of it.
“When it went back to 1-1 you worry about what might happen, but we showed grit and steel – we’ve got that in abundance now. It’s a hell of a result for us, a club that were struggling at the beginning of the season. We’ve come a long way in a short space of time and I’m extremely proud of all the boys and the management team.”
Spasov has now scored four goals in his last four appearances for Slough, with several of those coming as a substitute. But he was in from the start against Bath and repaid his manager with another clinical finish inside the six-yard box.
“It was brilliant from Munashe and Slavi has got another striker’s finish,” added Davies. “I think all his goals have come from inside the six-yard box and that’s great. That’s where you want to score your goals and you don’t care how they come.
“But I could go through the whole team tonight and praise their workrate. Even I’ve got cramp tonight for the first time in about 10 years. I’m buzzing with that result. I’ll go to work tomorrow and for the rest of the week I’ll have a smile on my face until Saturday comes when we’ll go to Weymouth.
“They showed a moment of brilliance (Jordan Thomas) to get back into the game, but for us to react. When it went back to 1-1, I did worry, I thought the onslaught would be on but low and behold we managed to get a winner.
“It’s nice to be able to help get the boys across the line. It’s a nice hit. I’ve just seen it on twitter and it’s nice to play my part. I have to justify picking myself in the team, and I had a couple recently that I put over the bar, but as soon as I hit that tonight, I knew I had hit it sweet, and it’s obviously shaved the post and gone in. I didn’t care who scored tonight, but it’s a huge win. I think we have a 12-point gap now (to the bottom four) with a couple of games in hand on teams. We’re in dreamland in terms of where we were a few weeks ago, but we just want to get to
48/50 points as quickly as we can, just to take the pressure off. Last season from January to the end of the season it was difficult. Just looking at the league table constantly. It consumes your mind. I’m not saying we’re going to go and get in the play-offs or anything like that, but we just want to get to 48/50 points. We have a tough January, but to beat Taunton at home and Bath away, it’s just an extremely proud night for everyone involved.”
“The fans, I think there were 60 or 70 tucked away in the corner. Thanks very much for coming because it is extremely cold. To put a smile on their faces,
I’m sure they’ll go back down the M4 happy.”