FA TROPHY BUCKS FIZZ!
TELFORD TOO GOOD FOR POOLS
LOCAL boy Jack Richards put Maidstone United a step closer to Wembley – but caretaker boss Simon Walton knows they’ve got to up their game to beat the drop.
Richards, who joined the Stones when he was 12, struck the decisive blow in the first-half.
It means midfielder Walton and his joint-caretaker Tristan Lewis have now won three of their four games since taking the reins following Harry Wheeler’s exit.
Tuesday sees a crucial clash at the bottom of the table when they take on Maidenhead and Walton says this win, however it came, can only build confidence.
“It’s a sign of a good team if you can play like that and win 1-0,” Walton, who felt the Stones were poor after the break, said. “We asked the lads for a clean sheet, they gave us that and we scraped a win. As the cliché goes, we’re into the hat.
“Lads came in and got minutes – winning games breeds confidence. When you look at the paper tomorrow and we won 1-0 and that’s what people see. We’re into the next round and who knows what can happen. But we’ve got a lot to improve on.”
National League South Oxford already had one topflight scalp this week following their extra-time win over Maidenhead – a rearrangement after the original game was abandoned with 15 minutes left when they were 1-0 ahead because of a deluge.
Had it not been for a vital block from Will De Havilland that took all the pace off Kabongo Tshimanga’s shot then they could have taken an early lead.
After Rob Swaine headed off target, Maidstone’s opener arrived on 36 minutes. Oxford had just been forced to change injured left-back Ben Jefford and the goal came from that side. Ollie Muldoon spread a wonderful cross-field pass to Jack Paxman, who jinked inside and crossed low where the arriving Richards slid in to slot past Craig King.
City’s top scorer Tshimanga couldn’t get any real power behind his header early in the second half before team-mate Josh Ashby whistled over from range.
Substitute Zac McEachran was unable to get the ball under his spell when he was played through as boss Mark Jones rued their finishing.
“Second half we gave a pretty good performance,” Jones said. “If there was one team that looked like they were going to score it was us.
“We got into a lot of good areas – our final ball was lacking, we didn’t really get our shots off with the right quality. I couldn’t fault our effort.”
STAR MAN: Ollie Muldoon (Maidstone) ENTERTAINMENT: ★★★★★