Stroud & District Four

Alkerton Rangers 5

Dursley Town Res 1

ALKERTON broke their duck for the season playing some excellent football despite the effects of Storm Brian.

From the first minute they stated their intent when Vaughan Wilkinson flashed a header wide.

Alkerton then began to play as Alkerton can with precision midfield interplay with Chris Pearce pulling the strings and Dave Potter and Lewis Vanstone posing the Dursley back line lots of questions.

After testing the water from distance, Kirk Wilkinson opened the scoring on 14 minutes as he used the wind to send a looping shot over the helpless opposition stopper following an indecisive clearance.

It was two on 25 minutes when Dave Potter chased Rich Baker’s searching ball and as the ball ran loose from the keeper’s challenge he was first to react to slot home.

The Eastington outfit were dominating and on 31 minutes Vanstone pounced after another Kirk Wilkinson drive was parried by the Dursley custodian to lift the rebound high into the net.

It was 4-0 just before the break as the impressive Henry Turner chested and volleyed home a right-wing cross from six metres.

In the second period despite Dursley having the wind behind their backs it was more of the same from the Snakey Lane eleven.

In the early stages, Dave Potter and Vanstone were both denied by the metalwork and Dave Potter saw a rasping effort acrobatically tipped over.

The away side were being tormented by the mercurial Vanstone and on 69 minutes he notched Rangers’ fifth cutting in from the right past two defenders before side-footing into the far corner.

Dursley hit back immediately as a free-kick beat the unsighted Chris Stark in the Alkerton goal. Stark was then called into action to palm a long-range shot past the upright, but that was as good as it got for Dursley as the green-and whites claimed the spoils.