IRON 0-1 Slough - matchday thread

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[dbbn]

It was a grey dismal day at Cressing Road as the new look Iron hosted 4th place Slough Town. Iron started with the same XI that triumphed last time out at Oxford. For the opening 15 minutes, Braintree were hardly out of their own half, unable to string any meaningful passes together or getting any tackles in. Slough were utilising their right flank where Warren Harris was getting in too often and putting in crosses. Despite the early pressure, there was no real alarm for young keeper Johnson. The first effort on target came from the Iron. Chiedozie had chased down an Oyinsan headed flick, but was nudged off the ball whilst in pursuit. The free kick was about 25 yards out on the left, Chiedozie went for goal, but the keeper was able to get across comfortably to catch. The Rebels first effort came shortly after, this time a left wing cross was met about 12 yards out in the centre of the box and Johnson had to be at full stretch to his right to keep the ball out. The visitors were mounting up the corners and the Iron were lucky not to have a penalty awarded against them when a Braintree did a two handed shove on his opponent pushing him to the floor. There was another near thing when they had a shot drilled just wide and following another corner, the ball was put in from close range, only to be ruled out for offside. Just when it looked like the first half may end goalless, the visitors popped up with the opening goal. A punt down the left was chased down between a Slough player and Howard, the full back was unable to stop his man and the ball was cut back to the near post where Johnson and an attacker collided, whilst the ball rolled free to Warren Harris to slam home from close range.
Words must've been said in the changing room at half time as it was a more competitive Iron that came out in the second half. They were now moving the ball quicker, closing down their opponents. Braintree had a great chance to equalise early on in the half, a ball from the left was played over the top out to Chiedozie on the far right, he looked offside as he collected the ball, but his first touch as he entered the penalty area was a bit heavy, with the keeper out at his feet, he managed to poke the ball around him, steady himself and hit a left footed shot straight at a defender. Shortly after that another similar move and again Chiedozie looked offside, he was further out this time and he tried to cross but the ball was intercepted and out for a corner. Slough were now happy to waste time and hit the deck at every opportunity to spoil Braintree's rhythm. Although the temp had improved, there were still to many passes that went astray in the final third. Cerulli came on for the disappointing Oyinsan and Barker for the earlier booked Fitzpatrick. Cerulli did get the ball in the net latching onto a header, but was offside. Slough brought on top scorer Ben Harris and he wasted a good headed opportunity when well placed in a rare Slough foray forward. From a free kick on the edge of the box near the byline, they tried an audacious shot which flew across goal and wide.
The Iron probably deserved a point for their second half efforts, but just lacked that extra bit of quality in the final third.

[tortoise]

Spot on review

[jonw]

Before this season, Iron had last faced Slough in the actual town of Slough, back in 1935.

The story was told in this article that appeared in the match day programme....

Braintree and Slough Town’s paths have not crossed very often. Before this season, our last game in Slough was back in 1935.

We first met in the Spartan League Premier Division in 1929-30. On 7th September 1929 the two clubs met for the first time at their old Dolphin Stadium. This had been converted to a greyhound stadium the previous year.

These were the early days of shirt numbering. Arsenal and Chelsea had used them in games on 25th August 1928 but the first season of compulsory use in the Football League was not until 1946-47. It appears that Slough were using numbers by this time as they had numbered their team 1-11 in the programme. We were numbered 12-22 as was the practice for away teams, although we did not pick up the practice of wearing shirt numbers until 1932-33 and would have worn blank shirts at Slough.

This was the opening game of the new season, and our first in the Premier Division after promotion from Division One East. On a very hot afternoon, Iron lost the services of Stanley Brown when he collapsed with sunstroke. With no substitutes in those days, the 10 men rallied superbly and won 5-3. Stan Wilcockson 2, Bill Gunn, Wally Shuttlewood and George Mews scored our goals.

Bizarrely, Shuttlewood was to experience scoring a goal in a 5-3 win at the Dolphin Ground for a second time a year later. On 17th September 1930 he did so while representing the Spartan League against the Isthmian League.

We also won 3-0 when Slough visited Cressing Road for the first time on 11th April 1930. At the end of the season Iron finished 7th, one place and four points above Slough.
Our two sides met in each of the five following seasons, with the home sides generally having the upper hand. Slough won 4-3 here in 1931-32 but at the Dolphin Stadium the teams shared a point each in an incredible 5-5 draw. The final pre-war meetings saw Iron win 8-2 at home on 13th October 1934, but lose 6-0 away.

Slough continued to use the Dolphin Stadium until 1974, with the ground surviving for a few more years. The club moved to Wexham Park, where they enjoyed seven seasons in the top tier of non league football in the 1990’s.
Our paths met again, briefly, for two seasons between 2004-06 in the Ryman League Premier Division. By that time Slough had lost Wexham Park and were using Windsor & Eton’s Stag Meadow ground. We won both home games, but lost both the away ones. Our promotion at the end of that season signalled the last time we would face Slough until this season and we enjoyed our visit to their impressive new facility in December, if not the result!