Tamworth Men's Firsts Vs Shrewsbury

Tamworth Men’s First XI led twice before succumbing to a 3-2 defeat at Shrewsbury.  The hosts started the better side and Tamworth had to work hard to keep them out as they were awarded a number of penalty corners which were kept out by Mike Pipe in goal.  Tamworth broke the deadlock however as a counter attacked saw Tom Hancox break into the right hand side of the D and square the ball past the final defender for Tom Sperrink to beat the onrushing keeper low into the corner.  Shrewsbury came back again and after the first strike was blocked the ball broke kindly for the Shrewsbury attacked to lash to the ball in on the reverse stick.  Tamworth then enjoyed their best spell of the first half and they were rewarded when James Goode’s pass escaped the reach of the Shrewsbury defender and Sperrink fired his shot into the bottom left corner.  Tamworth looked good to take the lead into the break but with the final phase of the half Shrewsbury capitalised after playing the advantage following a foul and again struck a reverse stick goal.

The second half was a far more open game with attacks swinging from end-to-end but it was Shrewsbury who made the breakthrough when they won the ball in midfield and a pass from the right wing was converted to hand them a crucial lead.  Tamworth were down to 10 men for a short period following a harsh yellow card for Ian Wagstaff pushed forward in the final stages and threw caution to the wind but unfortunately couldn’t make the crucial breakthrough as Wagstaff was denied by the keeper with a strong save to prevent his drag flick from a penalty corner.