Spitfires motor in Shots thriller
Apre-Christmas cracker of a game had everything as Aldershot Town were both resoundingly thrashed by a rampant Eastleigh side and unlucky to not snatch a point in a chaotic finale.
The Spitfires – knocked out of the FA Trophy last week by their Hampshire neighbours – roared into a convincing 5-0 lead, in part by capitalising upon some slack defending, to earn just a third away win of the season. By the final whistle, however, after a 60-minute second-half, home manager Tommy Widdrington was daring to dream that his side might complete a stunning comeback.
“I believe that this was a good time to play them, I know how we were after beating Reading,” observed Eastleigh boss Richard Hill, after the Shots’ midweek FA Cup heroics. “It was a solid performance for just over an hour. We were clinical when we had to be, but it’s just the other end of the field that I have to get right – for some reason we just panic and implode.”
Hill was full of praise for his outstanding attacking trio, Paul McCallum, Chris Maguire and Scott Quigley, who combined to devastating effect. McCallum opened the scoring, firing an angled shot through Jordi van Stappershoef ’s grasp.
Aldershot had chances of their own, for Josh Stokes and Stuart O’Keefe, but with O’Keefe still off the pitch receiving treatment for a head cut, Bailey Clements fired in the rebound from van Stappershoef ’s punched clearance.
Stokes again went tantalisingly close, but Maguire’s lethal counter-attack, as he cut inside from the left and fired a shot which deflected off Coby Rowe into the net, underlined the visitors’ superiority.
Tommy Willard and Haji Mnoga were caught in possession as McCallum and Quigley produced composed finishes to seemingly put Eastleigh out of sight, but belatedly the Shots rediscovered their fighting spirit.
Jack Barham slid in to meet Ollie Harfield’s cross. Stokes fired in a fine shot at Joe McDonnell’s near post and when Barham shot just wide seconds later, Eastleigh were suddenly rattled.
A feisty brawl, provoked by Quigley’s late challenge on Tolaj, brought a flurry of yellow cards for both teams – including yet another for
Widdrington – and a sending off for Spitfires captain Enzio Boldewijn.
Stokes had two further opportunities in a tumultuous climax, but when he wriggled clear of two defenders and beat McDonnell with a rasping shot it was, finally, too little too late.
The Shots, though, were still applauded off the pitch, even if Widdrington didn’t quite share the fans’ magnanimity.
“In the first half we shot ourselves in both feet,” he said. “Eastleigh didn’t have to do a lot for their goals.
“We won the second half, and I thought we could, maybe have got a result, but five was just too many.”