In the air tonight: Chester (a)

Cod Almighty | Match Report

by Mike Worden

6 September 2005

Chester City 1 Grimsby Town 2

Before the game the local press had made much of the fact that a win for Chester would have taken them to top of the division: their highest position for 19 years. When, with just over ten minutes of the game remaining, Michael Reddy coolly slotted home to put Town 2-1 up, those hopes were dashed and it was the Town fans who were reaching for the record books as another consecutive away win was on the cards.

In the close season Chester City ran into a few problems with the local council, who refused to issue a safety certificate until certain essential measures were taken at the Deva. Two pre-season games were cancelled as a result. Some bright spark must have had an idea: put in the biggest and loudest PA system ever installed in any public arena in the UK and the paperwork will be sorted. And then the club must have thought that the system could be used to do serious damage to the hearing and mental health of the travelling fans, by blasting out Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds at 180 decibels again and again. It was just like being back at Clouds in the 1980s.

Town's choice of a blue second strip was always going to catch them out against a team who play in blue and white stripes. There was only one option: go and get as many of last season's 'Mariners Pie' yellow away shirts as possible off the sale rack in the club shop. Then stick on names and numbers in various lettering styles and hey presto - a third-choice kit.

Town lined up with Mildenhall in goal and a back four of Croft, Jones, Whittle and Mr Nearly-600-Games, John McDermott; in front of them were Parky, Kalala, Paul Bolland and Gary Cohen; and up front were Reddy and Gary Jones, returning to his city of birth.

There isn't much to say about the first half. It was clear from the outset that the Branch/Blundell combination was going to prove a handful. But they met their match in the Town defence with Rob Jones in particular outstanding in the first half. He was everywhere, making tackles, heading clear and generally doing whatever needed to be done. At one point he cleared his own clearance. Because he was doing so well, his midfield team-mates sometimes decided to give him a little more to do. Bolland, for example, let in Gregg Blundell but the former Donny man shot wide. Rob Jones earned a booking for a tackle on the halfway line and then Kalala and later Cohen followed him into the book for incurring the wrath of Mr Singh.

Chester looked lively going forward, whereas Town looked a bit stale, tending to hit it from the halfway line towards Gary Jones and Reddy. It took 40 minutes for the first proper chant of "Mariners, Mariners" to drift across the Chester air. But we defended well.

No changes at half time for either side, but something would soon change. Town won a couple of corners in succession. The first one was actually given after Gary Cohen had put the ball out, but Mr Singh must have thought that what he had seen was so daft that it couldn't be true and it must have been a corner. From the second Parkinson corner Rob Jones was clearly bundled over in the box. Kalala stepped up to take the penalty and made no mistake.

Chester went in search of an equaliser and found it within two minutes. Branch ran down the right and crossed to the running Lowe, who shot past Mildenhall. Oh how happy they were. Chester could sense something in the air, and it wasn't just the so-called 'Sealand stink' drifting in from the sewage works.

Town had other ideas and went back on the attack. Michael Reddy came to life and caused problems for the Chester defence with his running and battling. [You've forgotten the other key component of his game, Mike. What about his falling over? - cynical Ed.] One of these efforts resulted in Parkinson being put through, but the man linked with a move to the Deva last year could only shoot inches past MacKenzie's left post. Reddy himself cut in from the right but his shot could only hit the side netting. Cohen had a little run, including a neat stepover, which came to nothing.

Town made two substitutions close to each other, Barwick and Gritton replacing Cohen and Gary Jones. It was Gritton's work down the Town left with just over ten minutes remaining that led to Reddy beating the home defence and finding himself with just the keeper to beat. Clinical finishing followed and Town were back in the lead. This time they were to hang on, although it took some serious defending - including bringing on Crane to shore up the back. Now that's serious. Curiously, soon after Reddy's goal, Luke Dimech, who had been beaten a number of times at the back by the town strikers, was announced as the sponsor's man of the match.

Mr Singh brought the game to an end after three extra minutes. The Town players formed a huddle in the Chester half of the pitch for some post-match bonding before heading over to those Town fans who hadn't already left to escape the ear-rending return of War of the Worlds.

Mike's man of the match
Michael Reddy's second half efforts were worthy of note, but the accolade must go to Rob Jones, without whom the game could well have been over at half time.