Victory at last for new Holwell Sports managers wwith cup win at Stapenhill
Holwell Sports chalked up their first win under delighted new management duo Ian Bitmead and Will Andrew as they won 1-0 at Stapenhill in the Midland League Cup on Tuesday night.
It was only the club's second win of the season and the first in 12 games since 29th August with Jake O'Reilly's fifth minute goal proving enough to progress, despite late pressure from fellow league strugglers Stapenhill, who had been down to 10 men after a red card on the hour.
Stapenhill are the next team above bottom placed Holwell in the Division One table, so three points rather than a place in the next round of the cup would have been preferable.
“It's a shame it was in the cup but we have to start somewhere,” said Andrew.
“It definitely wasn't a pretty game – it took a lot of hard work and grafting, especially when they went down to 10 men because, as often happens, they got better at that point, pushed on and threw everything at us.
“The lad was shown a straight red for a kick off the ball.
“They brought on their subs and gave it everything, but we managed to hold firm.
“They couldn't handle our wingers, Jake O'Reilly and Kyle Biggs-Finney, and we scored early when Kyle crossed to the back post for Jake to head in.”
He added; “We had two new players in the side and both had a very solid game.
“Brandon Williams, a centre half, has been with us for a couple of weeks since joining from Lutterworth where he played over 100 games for me when I was manager there and made his full debut last night.
“The other was Bayem Onelum, who is a centre forward from Aylestone Park.
“The lads have worked so hard in training and on the pitch to get to this point and last night's win really feels like we have turned a corner.
“Hopefully we can use this result to now push on in the league.”
It is back to Midland League Division One action on Saturday with a trip to Bustleholme, a side Holwell drew 1-1 at home with earlier this month, as Sports try to close the 10 point gap to safety.
“We will certainly be looking to get something again on Saturday,” said Andrew “We will attack them and try to get the result we need and deserve.”
Last weekend they had battled hard in a creditable 2-1 home defeat to Division One leaders Northfield Town, Benny Omorogbe on target for Sports on 61 minutes but they were beaten by strikes from Romano Graham and Rob Shaw.