Pitching In Northern Premier League
Saturday 26 March 2022

Stafford Rangers were beaten on the road for the first time in 14 league games but they were far from disgraced in defeat at title hopefuls South Shields.

Rangers were missing Ben Woods (injured) and Michael Tait-Moran (unavailable) from the side that beat Witton in midweek but Ethan Stewart returned after injury while Tuesday’s match winner Jake Charles was back in the starting line up.

Rangers played positive football from the start and went close inside two minutes through an overhead kick from Charles that went over.

Shields also posed a constant threat but JJ Hooper was unable to keep his shot down from Jordan Hunter’s centre while Will McGowan should have done better when well placed but he blazed over.

Tom Tonks forced a save from home keeper Myles Boney with a well struck free kick then missed a great opportunity to put Rangers in front when he hit the post after good work from Kaiman Anderson on the left.

Shields opened the scoring on 35 minutes. Blair Adams fed McGowan who put Hooper through to slot past Mateusz Hewelt.

Tonks had a couple more chances before the interval but sent one volley high and wide and saw a free kick deflect off the wall for a corner.

Rangers kept pressing after the break and Tre Pemberton was denied by Boney following Alex Fletcher’s free kick.

At the other end, Hooper headed over and Hunter fired over the intersection of bar and post.

Shields delivered the killer blow on 74 minutes. Darius Osei put Cedric Main through and he held off both Stewart and James O’Neill to poke the ball past Hewelt.

To their credit, Rangers never gave up but were denied a consolation goal when Boney tipped away a shot from Fletcher that was heading for the top corner.

South Shields: 1 Myles Boney, 2 Jordan Hunter, 3 Blair Adams (14 Alex Kempster 78m), 4 Jon Shaw, 5 Dillon Morse, 6 Jack Bodenham, 7 Mitch Rose (12 Sam Wilding 69m), 8 Robert Briggs, 9 JJ Hooper (16 Cedric Main 69m), 10 Will McGowan, 11 Darius Osei. Unused Subs 15 Will Jenkins, 17 Conor Tee

Stafford Rangers: 1 Mateusz Hewelt, 2 Andrew Burns, 3 Joe Dunne, 4 Alex-Ray Harvey, 5 Ethan Stewart (17 Theo Bailey-Jones 87m), 6 James O’Neill, 7 Tre Pemberton (14 Joe Kenton 73m), 8 Tom Tonks (15 Jediael Abbey 67m), 9 Jake Charles, 10 Alex Fletcher, 11 Kaiman Anderson. Unused Subs: 12 Luis Morrison-Derbyshire, 16 Josh Endall

Cautions: Adams, Rose, Kempster (South Shields), Pemberton (Rangers)

Referee: Glen Hart

Att: 2,676

Report: Chris Elsley