THE Magpies registered their first win of pre-season away at Longridge Town on Tuesday evening in what was another solid workout for Andy Preece’s side, writes Pete Tscherewik.
Chorley started on the front-foot and Billy Whitehouse was the one to break the deadline after a quarter of an hour, slamming the ball home smartly from just outside the box past Kier Barry.
Louis Britton was a tad unfortunate not to have his name on the scoresheet on a couple of occasions before the break, firstly after dinking the ball over Barry only to see the ball thud against the post – before minutes later, rounding the keeper after a smart ball over from Adam Blakeman, only to be flagged offside late by the linesman.
Justin Johnson continued his impressive pre-season form right from the restart having just come on, catching the Longridge defence napping so soon after kick-off and the winger did well to slot the ball home smartly past Barry from close range.
The Magpies continued to push for a third goal throughout the second-half, Ollie Shenton was the one to have the best and most opportunities to do so but the midfielder just couldn’t find the target and beat the goalkeeper on the night. Longridge did their best to retain possession but struggled to test Green between the sticks throughout the 90 minutes.
“Everybody got at least 45 minutes which is important at this stage of the pre-season, it’s just about getting those minutes in… we’re probably ahead of where we were last year so that’s good.” – Andy Preece
Longridge – Barry, Marshall, McLean, Wilkinson, Schofield, Gourley, Fletcher, Anderton, Homson-Smith, Smith, McGovern; subs: Ing, Turner, L. Hewitt, A. Hewitt, Skerritt, Lucas
Chorley – (first half) Green, Henley, Smith, Trialist, Kampos-Green (Blakeman), Calveley, Tomlinson, Whitehouse, Ubaezuonu, Sampson, Britton. (second half) Green, Price-Jordan, Wilson, Trialist, Blakeman, C. Preece, Nolan, Johnson, Birchall, Shenton, Scarborough.
Attendance 186
Referee Ollie Holland
Next Up Our first home friendly of the summer – National League Rochdale heading for the Chorley Group Victory Park Stadium on Saturday (3pm).
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