Scholars end Wands unbeaten home run- after nearly five months

Cray Wanderers and Potters Bar Town got to play their first match since 27th February last night- there’s no truth in the rumour that both sides turned up in wellingtons- and it turned out that the Scholars, particularly striker Brandon Adams, had coped with their enforced absence rather well.

Wands defeat at Whitehawk in that previous match had been their first in eight matches, and their home form was particularly good. Their previous defeat at Hayes Lane had arrived nearly five months ago, against Hornchurch (and defeat against Hornchurch is hardly rare for anyone this season)- and they were unbeaten in fifteen home matches in all competitions. Could they make it sixteen? As it turned out, the answer was no!

The visiting Scholars were five matches unbeaten, three places and six points behind their hosts, but they did have four matches in hand over tonight’s opponents, mainly because they’d been unable to host a match since February 6th.

Wanderers kicked off knowing that they were four unbeaten against these opponents, with two wins, but there certainly didn’t seem to be any kind of hoodoo for the visitors when they went ahead on eighteen minutes. Brandon Adams has been in fine form, and the Scholars number nine grabbed his fourteenth goal in twenty one matches when opening the scoring on eighteen minutes, converting a cross from close range.

The visitors probably deserved to hold the lead at half time, and they were also in the ascendency when they doubled it eight minutes after the restart, good work from Prosper Keto setting up Adams to find the net once more and take his tally to fifteen. At this point the hosts finally got going, but it took until four minutes from time for them to make a mark on the scoresheet, Gary Lockyer’s eleventh goal of his Cray campaign coming after a fine cross from substitute Alfie Evans.

Eight minutes were added, but the equaliser never really looked like arriving, and the Scholars had a fine victory to celebrate, opening up a- surely unassailable- fourteen point gap between themselves and the bottom four.

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