Royal Wootton Bassett Town Development's title hopes suffered a blow as they were held to a 1-1 by Malmesbury Victoria Development at the Gerard Buxton Sports Ground.
The Friday night fixture pitted Bassett, who had won seven games in a row, against a Malmesbury outfit who had won just one of their previous four games. They had, however, taken points off the league leaders Pewsey away from home earlier in the season, so a tough game was going to be in store.
Bassett's chances were significantly boosted just after the half hour mark though when Malmesbury had goalkeeper Archie Walsh sent off. But with first team manager and experienced goalkeeper Ant Brown playing out on the pitch they were able to cover this set back, albeit they were now one-man light against their title challenging opponents.
Despite the numerical disadvantage they went ahead three minutes after the dismissal, Joe Tranter smashing the ball home for his 16th of the season to make it 1-0 to Malmesbury and it remained that way at the break.
Bassett were back on level terms three minutes into the second half, and it came courtesy of an own goal as the Malmesbury defence failed to deal with a ball into the box.
Malmesbury went close to going back in front on 55 minutes, Jake Fortune seeing his shot come back off the cross bar. The home side had chances themselves but were unable to find a way past the stand-in keeper Brown.
In the end it finished honours and while Bassett remain second, they have now dropped the same number of points as Pewsey and therefore now need to win all their games in hand to draw level.
Credit: Mark Smedley
Last modified on Monday 28th February 2022 at 10:46
