Looking to build on their weekend win over top of the league Cheddar, the Red & Blacks travelled to Longwell Green Sports on a very wet Tuesday evening. Longwell started the game 7 points ahead of The Town and in the home fixture only lost by the one goal in a hard-fought match. The Town was also without their influential captain Charlie Walton who is serving a suspension. A good result this evening would show how much progress Warminster has made and so it proved to be with a fine 0 – 5 win over Longwell.

It took a while for the visitors to exert pressure on the home side and for much of the first half they had to defend deep and counter-attack on the break. However as the game progressed, Warminster began to reverse the pressure and create more opportunities to score.

The first goal for Warminster came in the 31st minute when Jack Miluk cut in from the right and shot from the edge of the box and the keeper, Powell unable to hold on to the ball. The second goal came 5 minutes later when Butler shot fairly centrally from outside the box, the keeper parried the ball into the air only to see it bounce behind him and into the net.

The third goal which was Miluk’s second came from a defensive clearance which found Martin Johnson near the halfway line. Johnson picked out Connor McKay who played it out to Miluk on his right and in a similar position to the last goal scored again. Warminster went close again just before the halftime whistle when Eban Mortimer-Taylor floated in a superb free-kick just inside the final third run onto by Lewis Graham who stretched but put the ball over the bar.

With a three-goal lead Warminster could have sat back in the second half but with rain lashing down and the wind against them continued to increase their lead. An early chance came just 4 minutes in when Miluk looking for his hat-trick headed over the bar. Mortimer-Taylor went close in the 58th minute when his shot was lifted over the bar by Powell.

The fourth goal came in the 63rd minute when McKay crossed from the right immediately in front of goal was met by Martin Johnson at the back post and fired home with no one to stop it. Around 5 minutes later the fifth and final goal was scored by Mortimer-Taylor who made a good run down the Warminster left to pick up a high ball, beat the keeper who was running out to meet him and tucked the ball nicely into the right-hand side of the net into the bottom corner.

This was another solid performance by Warminster, the back four proving difficult to beat and with other players sitting in front of them when needed made sure that a clean sheet was the order of the day. The team has been improving week on week and manager, Andy Crabtree has to be given great credit for the way he has organised the team and helped the young players to gel and play good football.

The future looks bright for the Red & Blacks, and it was also good to see excellent support from the travelling supporters who braved the rain.

Team: Ball, Baggs, Barnes, Graham, De Silva, Churchyard, Miluk, Mortimer-Taylor, Johnson, McKay, Butler.
subs(*used): Herd*, Lisowski*, Pollock*