FA Vase first qualifying round
Shortwood United 5
Tuffley Rovers 0
SHORTWOOD UNITED delivered an FA Vase five-star performance to shock Tuffley Rovers.
Sitting a division below their Hellenic Premier Division rivals, Shortwood were very much the proverbial underdog.
However, they rocked Mark Pritchett’s side on 13 minutes as Joe Wilton continued his prolific start to the season with a neat finish from a Lee Bowles cross.
Earlier, Shortwood handed a debut to Ben Snook, who signed for the Nailsworth club from Fairford Town.
And it was former Slimbridge player Max Harper-Emerson marked his debut with a second on 28 minutes after replacing the injured Wilton.
Shortwood put the game to bed after the break with a sumptuous strike from defender Tom Hoskins and the gloss was sealed when Bowles helped himself to a quick-fire brace.
Joint-Shortwood boss Matt Blythe said: "Saturday, was a strong performance by the squad. I’d been to watch Tuffley the week before and I was very impressed with a few of their players, so we knew we’d have to be on our game.
"It was a very competitive game as we expected, but we got ourselves ahead with a couple of quality goals. We had to defend well at times during the second-half as we came under a period of pressure, but stayed composed and finished the game well with some good goals. Jason Scrivens (co-manager) summed it up best when he said it was our most complete performance so far. We just have to keep working hard."
Shortwood travel to Hellenic Premier Division Fairford Town in the second qualifying round.
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