PAT ON THE BACK HELPS HAWKS BREAK THEIR AWAY DUCK

NEW signing Matt Paterson starred in his second debut for Havant & Waterlooville as he inspired them to their first away win since August.

Paterson, who made the move back to the Hawks from Welling United this week, took just nine minutes to open his account and then watched as Andrew Robinson and sub Hassan Jalloh wrapped up a precious win for Lee Bradbury’s men.

“It was very good,” Bradbury beamed. “It was a very hardworking performance, a very good battling performance, and we had good quality as well.

“We got our noses in front and they literally threw the kitchen sink at us for about 60 minutes, to be fair. But, we defended very well, and we caught them on the counter-attack.”

Paterson gave the Hawks the best possible start when tapping in from close range.

The Hawks then doubled their lead eight minutes later when Robinson curled a stunning close-range free-kick over the Wood wall and into the top corner.

Wood then had to come at the Hawks and did just that, but Havant defended stoutly.

However, the hosts did manage to find a way through and halve the deficit 20 minutes

from time. Excellent work from Sorba Thomas down the right saw him beat his marker and drive the ball low across the goal for Idris Kanu to place home at the back post.

Both Thomas and Kanu went close to bringing Wood level but Havant wrapped it up deep into time added on when Alfie Rutherford nicked the ball from Tom Champion inside of the area and attempted to round Legg, but was brought to the ground for a penalty. Legg did superbly to save Rutherford’s spot-kick with a low dive to his left, butJalloh was on hand to stroke home the rebound.

Dejected Wood chief Luke Garrard groaned: “You can’t defend like that, I don’t care what level you play at, you can’t defend like that. Dog and duck, fish and chip, or Premier League, if you defend like that, you are going to get goals against you.

“But, we are a group and we are sticking together; we are not going to fold, we are not going to implode, and we have got a big game against Gateshead on Saturday and a big week to prepare for that.”

B.WOOD: (3-5-2): Legg 5; Champion 5, Stephens 6, Fyfield 6; Woodards 5 (Thomas 46, 5), Shakes 6, Ricketts 6, Shields 7, Ilesanmi 6 (Ash 75, 6); Shaibu 5 (Ugwu 61, 6), Kanu 7. Subs not used: Burbidge, Parry

HAVANT: (4-4-2): Dudzinski 6; James 7, Robertson 6, Cordner 6, Williams 6; Fogden 7 (Frost 67, 6), Robinson 7, Lewis 7, Paul 6 (Rose 46, 6); Paterson 7 (Jalloh 67, 7), Rutherford 7. Subs not used: Woodford, Sekaija