Stevenage close to throwing it away
TEDDY Sheringham was elated with the performance of his Stevenage side for 80 minutes, but warned his players they can’t let their performance levels drop during games.
Stevenage were 4-1 up against Morecambe with ten minutes remaining, but the visitors responded and scored twice in the final minutes.
Kevin Ellison cancelled out Dean Wells’ opener for the hosts, before the outstanding Chris Whelpdale scored a hat-trick. Paul Mullin and Ellison scored two late goals for The Shrimps.
The victory was Boro’s second on the bounce, having beaten Bristol Rovers 2-1 on Tuesday, and moves them up to 18th, ten points above the relegation zone.
“I’m delighted with us getting the three points,” Sheringham said.
“I was delighted with the way we played in the first-half, it was probably our best 45 minutes of the season.”
Wells’ thumping effort from a corner got Boro off to the perfect start, but Ellison’s fine curler six minutes after levelled proceedings.
Stevenage were intent on capitalising on a pedestrian Morecambe defence, but Ben Kennedy and Whelpdale both had penalties saved from Barry Roche either side of the latter’s goal in the 20th minute.
Much like his first goal, Whelpdale cut in from the right before finishing superbly to give Stevenage a 3-1 lead after the interval and he scored his third with a tap-in at the far post after a calamitous mix up between Roche and Laurence Wilson.
Morecambe reduced the deficit to two on 82 minutes through Paul Mullin’s penalty, and Ellison volleyed home his second of the game with the last kick.
“We let in a very good team after 80 minutes and nearly came unstuck. I knew Morecambe would keep going until the end,” Sheringham added.
“We’ve talked about playing the game for 50, 60, 70 minutes and today we got to about 80 but that’s still not enough.We got a wee bit fortunate that there wasn’t another five minutes to go after their third goal.” Morecambe boss Jim Bentley was left seething with his side’s defensive play as they conceded for the 37th time in the league this season to drop them to 17th position.
He moaned: “We scored three and could have scored more but at the other end, if anyone puts pressure on us, we’ve got a couple of lads who are really struggling for confidence and we’re too easy to score against.
“That’s been our problem all season.
“That’s why we’ve got the second worst defensive record in the league and that’s very frustrating.”