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Birmingham Citadel 3 (S Hopkins, R Gudza, I Law) ; Sutton United 2

I actually remember bits of this game so the match report will be slightly better than the last two. Citadel totally dominated the first half and went in two nil up. The passing and work rate of the team had improved ten fold since the previous two games. Shane scored first when a mistake by the Sutton keeper enabled him to slot the ball in from an easy chance. Citadel then wasted chance after chance, with Shane and Ramoth the main culprits. Ramoth did make up for his missed chances when after a nice move down the left, he broke the offside trap. Racing into the area there were men to square the ball to, but he had the confidence to finish the move himself, beating the keeper at his near post. Citadel continued to dominate but still wasted too many chances. HT 2-0.

The second half was different to the first in the fact Sutton began to get into the game. However Citadel's defence was looking comfortable and the lead could have been extended still when Simon Black had a shot brilliantly tipped onto the post by the Sutton keeper. However Sutton were creating more chances and eventually they scored with about 20 minutes to go. From a corner their substitute, who may I add is ridiculously huge, rose unchallenged to score with a header. Then the Citadel manager produced an inspired substitution, or at least I like to think I did. Jonny Pearce was replaced by yours truly with 15 minutes left. With 5 minutes to go my master stroke (or probably just pure luck) paid off. Simon laid the ball off to Scott, whose first time lay off fell straight into Ians run and enabled him to score the all important 3rd goal. Citadel did still have time to concede again mind, and a brilliant volley it was as well, but there wasn't really enough time left for Sutton. A much improved performance, but Citadel need to carry it on into next week. FT 3-2

Team:
Stuart Stanley
Steve Buchan
Richard Black
David Maybury
Chris Black
Ramoth Gudza
Ian Law
Marc Richardson
Shane Hopkins
Simon Black
Jonny Pearce