UXBRIDGE (3) 6 Tunnell (2) 4, 64,
Moore (2) 9, 23,
Gill 50, K.Cleary 68
HOLMER GREEN (0) 1 Scholes 79
Uxbridge comfortably eased through to the next round of the FA Cup with a comprehensive victory over Spartan South Midlands League side Holmer Green. The Reds went into the game with a worrying statistic hanging over them that they had only scored in one of their last six matches in the FA Cup. Four minutes into this seasons competition though that was all forgotten as Lee Tunnell rose to head in Chris Moore's cross and put his side into the lead. Five minutes later any Holmer Green aspirations of a giant killing were well and truly ended when Paul Mills sent over a curling cross from the right and Gavin Bamford knocked the ball into the path of Moore to score from close range. Moore grabbed his second midway through the first half, again from close range, after Holmer Green goalkeeper Richard Lockey had parried a Mills shot and the Spartan League side were overrun by the strength of the Uxbridge midfield and attack. In the twenty seventh minute Dean Clark tested Lockey with a shot from a sharp angle which the 'keeper did well to push wide for a corner. A few minutes' later Clark's shot was blocked and Mills put the rebound wide as the home side continued to surge forward at every opportunity.
Tunnell had already shot over from inside the six yard box when five minutes into the second half Reds captain Mark Gill got in on the goal scoring act with a header from another Mills cross which opened his account for the season and then just after the half hour Gavin Bamford sent Tunnell through on goal and he calmly slotted home his second past the helpless Lockey. Bamford himself made a fine run almost immediately after Tunnell's goal and looked to be about to get on the score sheet with a clever lobbed shot but Lockey stuck out a hand to push the ball around the post. When Kevin Cleary fired in number six from a Clark corner shortly afterwards though it looked like the Reds might even hit double figures but to Holmer Green's credit they continued to battle and were rewarded eleven minutes from time when substitute Tim Scholes grabbed a late consolation, tapping into an empty net after Sean Dawson had got a hand to Brain Stottor's fierce shot. In the dying minutes the visitors could have bagged another as Scholes forced a good save from Dawson and then Mark Faraday wasn't far off target with a thirty-yard effort. By then though the game was over as a contest and Uxbridge had rewarded the Honeycroft faithful with their second goal feast of the season and it was only the first Saturday in September! The Reds will now play another Spartan League side, Potters Bar Town, at Honeycroft in the next round a week on Saturday.
UXBRIDGE: Dawson, S.Bamford (Ryder 58), Granville (Brooks 74), K.Cleary, Weedon, G.Bamford, Mills, Gill, Tunnell, Moore (Castagnette 77), Clark.
HOLMER GREEN: Lockey, Martin (Lees 68), Ivers, Richards, Crook (Scholes 72), Hamilton (Glennister 45), Thornton, Faraday, Stottor, Duncan, Chisholm
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