Match 43
7th April 1928
Gillingham (h)

Western League
Lovell’s Athletic (a)

EXETER CITY 2 GILLINGHAM 2.
Saturday, April 7th 1928.


In dull but pleasant weather and on a fast ground Exeter City met Gillingham at St James's Park in the second of their Easter Holiday matches. Yesterday, while the Grecians lost 2-0 at Millwall, the "Hoppers" were beaten at home by Swindon 1-0, the goal being scored in the first minute of the game. Exeter were unchanged from yesterday. There were 6,000 spectators.

Exeter City: Wainwright; Pollard and Charlton; Phoenix, Pool, and Mason; Purcell, McDevitt, Dent, Vaughan, and Compton.

Gillingham: Hebden; Robertson and Tyler; Boswell, Hodnett, and Ellis;
Millington, Dominy, Wilcox, Dowell, and Poxton.

Referee: Mr J.V.Pennington, of Reading.

This might be described as a typical holiday game, or a typical "end of a season match". Either description would suffice. The players shaped as if they were tired of the ball after the first few minutes, and the good play came only in rare flashes. Exeter, after a bright opening, fell away badly and played such poor football that the visitors deserved the goals which had come their way so luckily. All the same, the City were the better of two poor teams in the second half, which can only be described as ragged, and they earned the equalising goal which saved a point. It is a happy knack of Exeter City that they rise to the big occasion, so in spite of today's sad story the chances are that Millwall will have a very hard match here on Monday.

Dent opened the scoring for Exeter in five minutes. Twelve minutes later the visitors got a lucky equaliser; a shot by Poxton which Wainwright would have saved hit Pollard on the head and the course of the ball was diverted, the change of direction beating Wainwright.
Five minutes before the interval Exeter were shaping poorly, mistakes being made all over the field. Millington centred to the City goalmouth, and Pool sent the ball into his own net (for the second time in two successive games on two successive days!) attempting to hook it over his head to clear. Precisely at three quarter time Vaughan headed a corner kick from Purcell into the net, just below the crossbar.


WESTERN LEAGUE
LOVELLS ATHLETIC 1
CITY RESERVES 2.


In this afternoon's Western League match at Newport the Lovells team scored first through Crook all against the run of the play. Equality was restored by Kirk with a hard shot which beat Evans pointless shortly before half time. Within one minute of the restart Kirk beat the defence and centred to McDade, who hit the ball first time into the net for the winning goal.

Comments

Allowed tags: <p>, <a>, <em>, <strong>, <ul>, <ol>, <li>