Football
Final friendly ends in defeat

Loughborough Dynamo 3 Rugby Town 0

Friendly

RUGBY rounded off their pre-season campaign in disappointing fashion with defeat in Leicestershire against NPL Division One opponents on Saturday.

Valley were left ruing a number of missed first half goalscoring opportunities before they conceded an opener just ahead of the interval.

However, Dave Stringer’s side looked particularly ineffectual in the game’s second period, allowing the hosts to extend the gap to a comfortable margin.

Having started slowly, Rugby went on to create five good chances with Seb Lake-Gaskin unable to capitalise on the first of these when he shot straight at the keeper from 18-yards, after his pace had opened up the defence.

Ross Miller then headed narrowly wide from a corner before Lake-Gaskin and Fazel Koriya combined well ahead of the latter’s curling effort bouncing back off the bar.

The same two players were again at the centre of the action when Koriya released Lake-Gaskin through the middle but Laurie Pearson was equal to his effort between the home sticks.

The final opportunity fell to Seb Hamilton after Craig Kelly’s clever flick had created an opening for him on the left hand side of the area, but once more Pearson was on-hand to prevent a goal with an impressive fingertip save.

Loughborough’s late first half strike came after Town failed to clear a looping ball into the box properly, allowing midfielder Rob Norris to volley home from 12-yards.

The usual smattering of substitutions blunted any threat Town had to offer after the restart, and they went further behind around the hour mark when Ed Booth was penalised for handball in the box for the second game on the trot.

Matt Langham stroked the resulting penalty home, despite Paul Shepherd diving the right way, and then Louis Hamilton rounded off the scoring with 11 minutes remaining when he fired the ball across Shepherd and into the net after a quick Dynamo break.

The closest Valley came to registering a consolation came when substitute Richie Allen challenged a home defender in their own box and the ball squirted just wide of the target.

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