MONDAY 30th SEPTEMBER 1968.

Port Vale 1-0 Exeter City.

ONE ERROR AND CITY PLAN IS PUNCTURED.

PORT VALE 1
Hickson; Boulton, Wilson; Goodfellow, Sproson, King; Mahon, Cullerton (James), Chapaman, Gough, Williams,
EXETER CITY 0
Shearing, Smyth, Blain; Balson, Harvey, Newman; Crawford, Banks, Bullock, Mitten, Pleat,

Scorer:
Port Vale: Gough,

Attendance: 5,235.

One mistake, one goal, and one more Fourth Division defeat for Exeter City at a cold Port Vale ground, The City made the error midway through the second half and the result was they were beaten 1-0, They played with only three forwards and relied heavily on the defensive plan, and it looked as if it was going to work until the 70th minuteChapman beat both Keith Harvey and Mike Balson and chipped the ball to Gough to head what proved to be the winning goal, In the first half Exeter did not look in any serious trouble, Vale played to find the big Chapman in the air, but the City defence coped well. But apart from Dave Pleat who made several good runs, Exeter never looked like scoring. Vale applied more pressure in the second half but did not carve out a real clear cut chance, Pleat late in the game had his shot fumbled by goalkeeper Hickson, who managed to recover just in time as Banks ran in, This is the first time that Exeter have failed to score in the League this season. City certainly worked hard enough, but they need to be more robust, City have now lost their last four away games,

Match Summary 

We went to Port Vale determined to hold on to a point, and, therefore, showed little sign of scoring. Unfortunately, the plan failed because of only one mistake and that one let Port Vale in to score the all-important goal through Bobby Gough in the 70th minute.