Vanarama National League North
Your Co-op Community Stadium
Saturday 20th November 2021

Brakes and Southport battled out a closely fought encounter in front of a raucous crowd on a chilly autumn afternoon on Harbury Lane.

Previous meetings between the two clubs in Warwickshire had never been settled by more than one goal, and a draw was probably the correct result between two of the form sides in the division currently.

Having made several changes in midweek for the Birmingham Senior Cup tie against West Bromwich Albion, Paul Holleran was forced into one alteration from his starting eleven that lined up at Chorley the previous Saturday, with Devon Kelly-Evans replacing the suspended Joe Parker.

There was little incident of any real note until the ninth minute when Leamington took the lead. It was a strong run by Dan Turner down the left that saw the Brakes’ leading scorer provide an assist by driving the ball back low into the centre for Kelly-Evans to drive first time past Cameron Mason into the net.

This temporarily curbed the enthusiasm of the noisy band of young visiting fans who had taken up residence in the car park stand. With the Brakes fans alongside them in the first half this made for an enjoyable and noisy atmosphere with plenty of friendly banter traded.

The prolific Jordan Archer, who came to prominence at nearby Bedworth United earlier in his career, almost capitalised on a loose pass back to Jake Weaver, getting to the ball just ahead of the Brakes custodian, but he was only able to lift his shot out of play. Charlie Munro then set off on a dangerous run through the Leamington half, but his shot travelled the wrong side of the post from a Southport perspective.

Dan Meredith (twice) and Stephan Morley both saw shots blocked, Morley later testing Mason with a stinging long range drive that was well held by the Sandgrounders keeper.

Just as Brakes looked relatively comfortable with half time approaching, they found themselves pegged back. Weaver appeared to misjudge a ball over the top, and Marcus Carver took full advantage to nudge it past him and into an empty net.

The second half took a long time to get going, with neither side able to take hold of the game, though Southport certainly did the bulk of the attacking, winning plenty of corners and opportunities to put the Leamington defence under pressure, but they stood up to the test well.

A shot cleared off the line after a scramble and a flying save from Weaver to divert the ball onto his crossbar was the closest the visitors came to a winner, while Edwards heading well over from a free kick and second half substitute Callum Gittings driving a low shot wide were all Brakes could muster in response.

‘It has probably been a bit different to previous games we’ve had here recently;’ said Paul Holleran afterwards. ‘We scored a good goal in the first half, created a couple of half chances; they came into the game as the half went on. We’ll be disappointed with their goal - we could do better, but I thought Marcus Carver was very good this afternoon. He’s as good as anything in the league and him and Jordan (Archer) up front are a real handful.

‘I think the biggest credit I can pay Southport is that like Chorley last week, their set plays are phenomenal. Whether it’s free kicks or throw ins they put balls in good areas and they’ve scored a lot of goals this year, so I think we’ve done alright with that part of it, but they’ve then got on top of us in the second half - it was plainly obvious that they were the better side, but neither goalkeeper has had a lot to do. We’ve grown into the game I think at the end and had a couple of efforts around the box, but I think the result is about right. It wasn’t one for the purists!

‘You’ve got to be able to cope with the physical side of things and that’s what we did really well today. I don’t think either side did enough to win it but I don’t think either deserved to lose it really.’

Attendance: 565

Leamington: Jake Weaver, Dan Meredith, Stephan Morley, Joe Clarke, Kyle Morrison, Jack Lane, Devon Kelly-Evans, Alex Prosser (15 Callum Gittings, 77), Kelsey Mooney (12 Kaiman Anderson, 90+3), Jack Edwards, Dan Turner.

Subs not used: 14 Kieran Cook, 16 Junior English, GK Josh Allen.

Southport: 1 Cameron Mason, 2 Charlie Oliver, 3 Jack Doyle, 5 Adam Anson ©, 6 Doug Tharme, 8 Charlie Munro, 9 Jordan Archer, 11 Marcus Carver, 15 Josh Hmami, 16 Dylan Vassallo, 19 Liam Edwards.

Subs not used: 7 Connor Woods, 10 George Newell, 12 Isaac Buckley-Ricketts, 13 Tony McMillan-Snelson, 17 Niall Watson.

Referee: Mr Aaron Bannister

Assistant Referees: Mr Alan Berrow & Mr Jamie Conde

Brakes Man of the Match: Devon Kelly-Evans.