Whitchurch Alport 1 Malvern Town 1

(Alport won 5–3 on penalties)

History makers Alport made it through to the third round of the FA Vase after a thrilling cup tie at the KMJ Mortgages Stadium against Malvern Town. In fairness to the visitors, they completely dominated the first half of the match and had they taken their chances then they would have been out of sight by half-time. Somehow, the Reds went down the tunnel with the deadlock yet to be broken and much of that was down to the heroics of man of the match, Ellis Allen, who was superb between the posts for the home side.

Louis Loader smashed a freekick against Allen’s right-hand post after just five minutes as the away side stated their intent from the first whistle. Joe Bates brought the first save out of Ellis who blocked the shot with his legs on 13 minutes and the same player had time to get another effort on goal but dragged the ball wide of the post and then just before half-time, the home goalkeeper made a double save with the last one denying Mark Clark a certain goal. The Reds competed better in the second 45 but it was Town who went in front with just 20 minutes to play and Alport faced an uphill battle to stay in the competition. Then, on 75 minutes Alport were awarded a spot kick after inexplicably, a Malvern hand went on to the ball with half a dozen or so defenders in a cluster with no obvious threat from those wearing red. Alex Hughes – Mr. Cool in situations like this – comfortably stroked the ball into the bottom corner and suddenly it was game on once more. It was end to end stuff as both teams slung away like two Heavyweight boxers in the 12th round of a world title fight. Ultimately, there was no further scoring and so the game needed to be decided on spot kicks. Ivan took the first one and comfortably beat Blackburn in the Malvern goal and then Ellis saved Town’s first penalty to give Whitchurch an early advantage. Jack Griffiths comfortably stroked away another penalty before the away side made it 2–1. Jimmy Garlick kept up Alport’s 100% record and Town kept themselves in contention by beating Ellis with their next kick. Celson Segunda was next to beat Blackburn meaning Malvern had to score to give themselves any chance of dragging themselves back into the tie. They did, leaving Hughes to make himself the hero by converting the fifth of Alport’s penalties to spark joyous scenes on the pitch and amongst the home supporters.