Saints Fall Short In Title Quest, Despite A 2-0 Victory Against Bala Town

Match Report

Goals: Clark (10), Cieslewicz (54)
Red cards: Harrington (19)
Substitutions: Smith for Brobbel (70), Draper for Robles (79), Holland for Cieslewicz (79), Bailey for Mullan (87)

Match report by Sam Wood

The New Saints did all they could, but a 2-0 victory against Bala Town wasn’t enough to prevent the JD Cymru Premier trophy from returning to the Deeside Stadium for a second consecutive season.

Despite collecting the full complement of points at Park Hall, Connah’s Quay Nomads also did the business with a win at Penybont, which maintained their two-point cushion at the top of the table.

As a result, The Saints will take part in the brand new UEFA Europa Conference League, which runs its inaugural season in 2021/2022. 

It was a fast start from Limbrick’s side, who took a 1-0 lead with just 10 minutes on the clock. Ben Clark got on the end of Ryan Brobbel’s defense-splitting pass and showed great skill to round visiting goalkeeper, Harri Lloyd, before tapping the ball into the empty net to settle the early nerves.

In the 19th minute though, disaster struck for The Saints, as Ryan Harrington was shown his marching orders for pulling back Kieran Smith, leaving the team in green and white to play out the rest of the match with 10 men.

As a result, it was all Bala for the remainder of the first-half, and The Saints were forced into some backs to the wall defending. Will Evans came close to connecting with a couple of dangerous crosses, before Kieran Smith sent a volley wide of the post.

The closest Colin Caton’s side came to equalising though was in the 35th minute, as a Chris Venables snapshot almost snuck in at the far post.

Having reached the half-time whistle a goal to the good, The Saints regrouped at the break, and started to dictate the play once more following the restart.

With 49 minutes played, the hosts probably should have had a penalty, as Keston Davies was pulled down inside the area, but were denied the chance to get an insurance goal.

But just five minutes later, The Saints took a comfortable grip of the game thanks to a goal from Adrian Cieslewicz. After being teed up on the end of the box by Ryan Brobbel, the Polish winger caught Lloyd off guard with his shot, and the ball crept in at the far post.

Despite falling two goals behind, the Lakesiders didn’t give up the ghost, and a chance to pull one back flashed wide of the post just after the hour mark, before Henry Jones went close with an edge-of-the-box free-kick.

Paul Harrison pulled off one final save of the season seven minutes from the end to deny Kieran Smith and preserve his clean sheet, as his side made comfortable work of what, at one stage, looked like a difficult afternoon.

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