| Date | Saturday 5 April 2014 |
| Match | Royston Town v Leighton Town |
| Competition | Calor League: Central Division One |
| Result | Won 2-1 |
| Attendance |
156 |
| Royston Scorers | Ingrey, Fehmi |
| Crows MoM |
Kaan Fehmi |
After last Tuesday’s second half performance all involved with Royston Town must have had high hopes for this home fixture against struggling opponents, Leighton Town. Steve Castle stuck with the same starting line-up who had demonstrated some exciting moves at St Ives, entrusting them to maintain the distant, but not impossible, play-off place challenge.
The match was, however, a scrappy affair with limited spells of real quality, punctuated with two fine individual home team goals and a late consolation score from the plucky visitors to make the last ten minutes a lot more uncomfortable than they should have been.
On six minutes, Ryan Ingrey, as determined as ever, crashed an early shot against the bar following some promising build up play from Kaan Fehmi and Reece Dobson and Ross Collins blasted a decent chance high over the bar. Hasty, sometimes frantic, build up play saw no intrinsic quality in front of goal and this lack of cutting edge allowed Leighton to get more into this game and on the quarter hour Royston keeper George Lawton was called into action to make a superb diving save to keep them out.
The Crows continued to toil and were often halted by minor spoiling fouls that did nothing to aid their own tempo of build-up play. Leighton put in some dangerous long balls including some impressive long throws that caused concern, but Lawton stood tall with some good handling, ably supported aerially by Joe De La Salle and Ryan Wharton.
Up the other end De La Salle flicked a header just wide and Dobson was coming more into this game with some tricky menacing runs on goal. With the game meandering to half-time, midfielder Ingrey produced a moment of magic to break the deadlock. A period of home team possession play worked the ball to Ingrey in a central position who hit a left foot thirty yard screamer high into the top left hand corner, giving Leighton keeper, Matt Griggs, no chance whatsoever.
The second half followed a similar pattern. There was no doubting Royston’s effort and endeavour, but the final pass or shot just eluded them on numerous occasions.
Two early chances with the ball being played through the left side channel saw Dobson and then Luke Robins shoot across the goal and a first substitution on 56 minutes replacing Collins with Robbie Nightingale and ten minutes later returning Striker Robbie Mason swapped for Dobson and Ryan Lockett was brought on for Ingrey to hopefully add more impetus.
A second goal was scored on 73 minutes with another piece of individual brilliance. A long ball was fed through to Fehmi whose first touch control was superb allowing himself a split second to release a low left foot effort under pressure from a desperate defender’s tackle and the shot sped just inside Griggs’ right hand post.
Leighton Town scored four minutes later when Lawton found himself in a fix, conceding a cheap corner that was half cleared but a far post cross was delivered and Enzo Silvestri headed in to make the last ten minutes a tense time that could have seen a late away side equaliser but overall this home side win was a fair result.
Team: Lawton, Bradshaw, Dhillon, De La Salle, Wharton, Bridges, Collins (Nightingale), Ingrey (Lockett), Fehmi, Dobson (Mason), Robins. Subs not used – Cambridge, Endacott.
