Vanarama National League North
Ecologic Stadium Bloomfields 
Tuesday 25th February 2025

Having made the long haul to the North East Yorkshire coast on Saturday, the Brakes team coach was clocking up the miles once more as Paul Holleran and his team embarked on another long journey; this time to Suffolk to take on Needham Market, who were of course promoted alongside Leamington last season as Southern League Premier Division Central Champions. 

It was not quite at the six pointer stage, but an important game nevertheless, as it represented a chance for the hosts to drag themselves out of the bottom four and closer to their visitors, while for Brakes it was a chance to pull further clear of that dreaded dotted line. 

During the warm up one of the Needham Market staff remarked that Leamington were one of their ‘local derbies’ - not a sentence you would expect to hear about two towns some 110 miles apart, but the reality facing clubs such as ourselves in the National League North is that for the hosts, a trip to Warwickshire is one of their ‘shorter’ journeys! 

There were three changes to the starting eleven from Saturday’s defeat at Scarborough. With Dan Turner having been recalled from his loan spell by Chester, and Joe Clarke and Tim Berridge dropping to the substitutes bench, Jack Edwards, Ant Lynn and Owen Farmer stepped up. 

There was almost a perfect tonic within 18 seconds of the kick off here, as Edwards swung a cross in from the right, and a home defender mis-kicked the ball onto the post. 

Both sides were well aware of the importance of the game, and did their best to commit to attack, with corners being forced at both ends in the opening exchanges. Henry Landers attempted to bludgeon his way through to goal with two thumping shots, the second of which was well blocked at the expense of a corner. 

Neither side were able to find a clear route to goal despite their best efforts, and the game became a little scrappy, with a bit of needle creeping in midway through the first half. Just past the half hour the Marketmen’s recent signing Teddy Collis headed a left wing cross towards goal, but it was a straightforward claim for Callum Hawkins. Luke Ingram then sliced a shot well wide of the target. 

Landers nicked the ball deep inside the Needham Market half soon after the restart, attempting to play Lynn in, but he was flagged offside. Dan Morphew was then cautioned after bringing down Lynn, who had muscled his way past the defender and looked to be in on goal. 

The travelling support, boosted by a contingent from nearby AFC Sudbury, were becoming frustrated with the ease at which the home side were being awarded free kicks, which was rarely reciprocated when the ball was going the other way. 

Iffy Allen dragged a low shot across goal and just wide from the right, before the hosts opened the scoring with 22 minutes to play. A free kick was played into the penalty area and inadvertently headed back across his own goal by Josh Quaynor, who like his team mates had had a solid game, but the ball was picked up by Reggie Lambe; a late inclusion in the starting eleven after skipper Keiran Morphew had picked up an injury, and the midfielder gave Hawkins no chance as he rammed a close range strike into the roof of the net to send the raucous youngsters behind the goal berserk. 

Owen Farmer was brought down, seemingly for the umpteenth time during the evening, this time inside the box, but as with every other occasion, Referee Joe Woolmer was not interested in any protests aimed in his direction. 

Allen and Lambe both went close to doubling their team’s advantage as the game entered its final ten minutes with Leamington staring down the barrel of a second successive defeat on the road having put in a far better performance than they had on Saturday. They just needed something to fall for them, and they were finally rewarded on 83 minutes when Landers pounced on a loose defensive header to crash a powerful low drive across keeper Marcus Garnham into the bottom corner. His celebration was brief as there was still time to find a winner, and Leamington came closest to doing that in the time that remained. Rob Evans won the ball in midfield and set on an amazing run that came to a halt just on the edge of the box, but not before he had almost played a team mate in. 

With almost the last action of the game Garnham picked up a blatant back pass as Brakes looked to be in with another chance for a late winner, but they were forced to settle for a point which keeps them 11 clear of Needham Market, who currently sit in the final relegation place, three points from safety but six clear of the three clubs below them. 

‘Coming into the game we knew it would need to be a gritty, determined and focussed performance,’ said the manager on the journey back to Warwickshire. ‘A Tuesday night, coming down here; the logistics of it are very difficult. Needham are another club, like ourselves, that are struggling with their pitch, so we knew the game would probably lack quality, which it did, but the lads ticked all the boxes that we asked for. I thought we were much more aggressive tonight; we won a lot of individual areas. I was encouraged with our first half performance and we started the second half really well. We had all the kind of half chances; never really felt in any danger in the game, and then all of a sudden, a very clever lofted ball in a channel, really we’ve had two bites of the cherry and we haven’t dealt with it, and it’s in the back of the net. 

‘We know from previous experiences with Needham how many clean sheets they’ve kept at home over the last few years, and how many games they’ve won 1-0. You know it’s going to be hard to open them up with quality because of the pitch. 

‘I’m so pleased for the players, because their performance deserved something tonight, and it showed their character as well, that they just kept going - a bit of a quality - a decent ball into the box, we kept the ball alive, boxed the area off well, and when it fell to Henry - you couldn’t wish for it to fall to a better player at the moment, and it was a fantastic finish. It’s got to be good to beat that goalkeeper, as we well know. It’s the first time we’ve got anything against them. 

‘I think the performance deserved more if I’m being honest, but it’s like a winning draw for us tonight. I think psychologically coming down and coming back from behind, everyone would have left that ground tonight looking at Leamington, looking at that performance tonight and how structured and hard working it was - that’s what you’ve got to do in this league sometimes on a Tuesday night. We’ve done that on the last few Tuesdays, whether it’s Warrington, Buxton and again tonight. I thought we deserved a clean sheet tonight, for our efforts. We should have been ahead after 25 seconds, but we’ll take that. It was one night where I was desperate for the players to get something, so I was really pleased that they did. It was thoroughly deserved - there were some really big performances tonight. They needed to bounce back from Saturday, and also needed to put in a proper Leamington performance tonight, which I think they did.’ 

Attendance: Unknown at present 

Needham Market: 1 Marcus Garnham, 3 Tommy Smith, 4 Kyle Hammond, 23 Reggie Lambe (9 Seth Chambers, 87), 6 Dan Morphew, 7 Luke Ingram, 11 Tevan Allen, 14 Jamie McGrath, 17 Ben Hunter, 28 Teddy Collis, 31 Iffy Allen (10 Jacob Lay, 79). 

Subs not used: 5 Keiran Morphew, 30 Josh Blunkell, 12 Ollie Fraser. 

Leamington: 1 Callum Hawkins, 3 Josh Quaynor, 6 Rob Evans, 7 Henry Landers, 8 Adam Walker ©, 10 Jack Edwards, 12 Will Shorrock, 14 George Ward, 17 Ewan Williams, 19 Ant Lynn (11 Tim Berridge, 78), 24 Owen Farmer (21 Joe Clarke, 78). 

Subs not used: 5 Theo Streete, 16 Jiah Medrano, 20 Jacob Humphries (GK). 

Referee: Mr Joe Woolmer

Assistant Referees: Mr Dario Matthewson & Mr Thomas Kelly

Fourth Official: Mr Joseph Karram

Brakes Man of the Match: Henry Landers.

Photos: Cam Screech.