HENGROVE ATHLETIC 3

Fillingham 28, 55, L Crewe 31

BRIDPORT 2

Salter 25, Bailey 41

BRIDPORT were handed their fourth defeat in five league games after a 3-2 loss to 10-man Hengrove Athletic in the Toolstation Western League Premier Division.

A wondrous lob from Mark Salter put the Bees in front on 25 minutes, but a quick double from Jack Fillingham and Luke Crewe saw the Hens 2-1 ahead just six minutes later.

Leigh Bailey then equalised on 41 minutes following a goalmouth scramble, before Fillingham grabbed his second 10 minutes after half-time before Crewe was sent-off in injury-time for an off-the-ball incident.

Speaking to Echosport, Bees’ boss Adam Fricker refused to blame recent postponements.

He said: “To be honest I could use (postponements) as an excuse, but Hengrove had played the same amount of games as us recently – it was like for like.

“You could see the lads were jaded – we’ve lost that rhythm of before Christmas.

“It was a heavy pitch and they played the conditions better than us. We tried to play football and got caught out.”

Talking through the goals, Fricker thought all three Hens’ strikes were avoidable.

“The ball broke to Salts 30 yards out. He worked it down the line and chipped the keeper from 25 yards. As soon as it left his foot you knew it was in.

“Then we didn’t defend a corner properly and it was straight to one of their lads on the edge of the box and he toe poked it in.

“For the second one, their right-back came forward looking to make a crossfield ball. He caught it sweet and it nestled in the top corner. He certainly didn’t mean it and there was nothing we could have done about it.

“Then there was a goalmouth scramble and Leigh managed to poke it in. Again, we allowed their left-back to travel forward.

“He went too easily past a couple of our players and squeezed it through and their lad had a simple tap-in from six yards. All three of their goals could have been avoided,” he said.

Fricker was also disappointed that his players had strayed from their gameplan.

He said: “The reason we lost was that we didn’t play the conditions. It was evident it was going to cut up. We wanted them to do the simple things, don’t mess around with it and we didn’t do that. We got punished for it.”

Hengrove: C Bush, L Crewe, Fear, Lewis, Brimble, C White, A White, Parsons (Hickery 84), Fillingham, B Crewe (Feehely 80), Mancini. Subs not used: Vaughan, R Bush

Bees: Hibbs, Andrews, Rutter, Bailey, Sweet, Thomas (Cornish 75), Richardson (Latas 70), Martin, Peach (Hill 65), Butcher, Salter

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