Burton Albion 1 Northampton Town 0





Well, I sank a brewery load on Christmas Day and talked a load of cobblers, so going to watch the Brewers v the Cobblers on Boxing Day was the natural choice.

I hadn't been to the Pirelli for a while, so I was looking forward to the trip and the game was well worth the visit. The Brewers are currently in the top 4 of League 2 while Northampton are languishing near the foot of the league. Last season both clubs made it to the play-offs and whereas the Brewers have taken off from where they finished last season the Cobblers have struggled. They sacked Aidy Boothroyd just before Christmas, so Burton were always favourites going into this game.

Neither of the teams started all that well, but it was clear that Northampton were going to sit back and hope to hit their opponents on the break, but at least they seemed to have ditched the hoof up the pitch that they were famous for last season - which actually might have encountered for their undoing. Hussey, Kee and McGurk all came close for the Brewers in the first half and Jimmy Phillips was attacking them down the wing with the support of Phil Edwards. When Northampton attacked Ian Sharps seemed to block them from worrying the goalkeeper too much. However, at the break it was still 0-0 and the Brewers could feel aggrieved not to have gone in with the lead.

The second half saw more of the same from the Brewers and Phillips continued to hassle the Northampton defence, but the shooting was a little wayward. Burton had more than 20 shots during the game, but Matt Duke in the Northampton goal wasn't especially bothered and towards the end it looked like the Brewers might pay for their finishing when Northampton had a couple of break away attacks. However, we didn't need to worry as Sharps with just 4 minutes remaining thundered a header into the back of the net to give the Brewers a much deserved win.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

shirt history AS Roma

Image
Roma were the club that I followed in Italy and although they are most famous for wearing red and yellow, hence the nickname giallo rosso the club didn't always wear those colours. AS Roma were formed in 1927 by a merger between SS Alba-Audace and Fortitudo-Pro Roma SGS with Italo Foschi being the driving force behind the merger. AS Roma could also trace their lineage back to FBC Roma who were formed in 1901 and who wore red and yellow, but the first shirts they wore took the red, white and blue of Fortitudo-Pro Roma. Roma soon established themselves at the top table of Italian football and in 1931 finished runners up to Juventus and by now had settled on red and yellow as their colours. However, you'll have to take my word for it because the picture below shows Attilio Ferraris in black and white. In 1942 Roma went one better and won their first Scudetto with Amadeo Amadei scoring 18 goals to help them secure the title. Pictured below he is wearing the change shirt with a repl
Read more

Boca Juniors shirt history

Image
The first game that I will be at on Sunday sees Boca Juniors take on Paris Saint Germain. I have always wanted to go and see Boca Juniors and I can't see me getting over to Argentina any time in the near future, so I am going to have to make do with seeing them in North London. On my travels I have met plenty of Boca fans, but funnily enough they have all been Russian or Ukrainian. I am a bit disappointed that Martin Palermo has now retired, but I am still looking forward to it. Obviously to do justice to the club history of Boca Juniors I'd probably have to write a book, so here's a quick history of their kit and colours instead. When Boca were formed in 1905 they originally played in pink, but obviously came round to thinking that this was a bad idea and changed to a light blue colour later in the year. They didn't stick with this shirt for very long either and for the 3rd time in a year decided to change the shirt colour, this time to black and white stripes. The fol
Read more

Sud Tribune, Dortmund

Image
The Sud Tribune at Westfalen is famed for the noise and support that it gives the BVB team. They started up early and carried on until well after the match had finished despite the poor result. At the end the team looked suitably disappointed when they thanked the fans. Nobody apart from the Hannover fans probably expected 96 to win. Hopefully better times for the Sud Tribune are just around the corner.
Read more