2nd November 2021
Dereham Town vs Bury Town @ Aldiss Park - Dereham
Isthmian Division 1 North (Step 4)
19:45 KO
£8 entry
Attendance - 224
Half-time score: Dereham Town 2-1 Bury Town
Goals:
Dereham Town: Bammant - 22'
Dereham Town: Jarvis - 32'
Bury Town: Hastings - 41'
Leigh Simons recorded the goals, see the links below:
Final Score: Dereham Town 2-1 Bury Town
Tonight, Leigh and I made the trip up to Dereham Town to see them play Bury Town in a hotly anticipated Norfolk-Suffolk derby game. This was my first time at Aldiss Park, and it was a great venue to visit, the pitch was immaculate and I will definitely be back. Both teams had been going well in the Isthmian North, however, both teams had also recently suffered heavy defeats, Bury Town going down 5-1 at home to Canvey Island, and Dereham Town also losing at home, 4-0 against Aveley, so both were looking to bounce back in a big way. It was also the first properly cold Tuesday night game of the year, winter is well and truly on the way!
As ever, I picked up a programme, and like the Bury Town programme, it was a substantial programme with lots of detail and excellent quality colour images, the second one I have seen from Wensum Print, the first being at Wroxham.
Bury Town started on-top, looking composed on the ball, but struggled to create any real chances. The first chance of note came in the 14th minute, Bury attacked down the left flank, the ball was crossed in, and after a bit of a scramble, it fell to Ramadan who controlled the ball in the air, turned and volleyed a shot goalbound, but it was straight at the keeper and saved.
Against the run of play, Dereham Town got the opening goal of the night, in the 22nd minute. A poor pass from Hood in the Bury defence was intercepted by Fisk, he played a one-two with Hipperson, who put Fisk through with a deft backheel, Fisk whipped the ball in to Bammant, he battled hard to create some space in the box, managed to turn and fire off a wild shot that was heading miles wide, but it took a wicked deflection off the back of Bury captain Fenn, and looped over the Bury Town goalkeeper, a very unlucky goal to concede.
After the goal, Dereham stepped it up a gear, and nearly went 2-0 up in the 25th minute. Dereham attacked down the right, the ball was crossed into the box, and a poor headed clearance fell to Hipperson, on the left of the box, who powered in a rising shot that was heading in, but lightning reflexes from Bury keeper Blair allowed him to tip the ball onto the bar and over, a superb save. However, he could not keep out the Dereham effort in the 32nd minute, a free-kick was awarded in a dangerous position, the ball was whipped in, a scramble in the box ensued, Bury failed to clear and the ball bobbled out to Jarvis who slotted home underneath Blair. There were some appeals for hand ball in the build up, but nothing was given.
Having gone 2-0 down in the space of 10 minutes, Bury played themselves back into the game, and were having the better possession, but Dereham were proving difficult to breakdown, and Bury were only able to create half-chances. In the 35th minute, Ramadan picked up the ball on the edge of the box from a corner, he twisted and turned to try and create an opening, and having no luck he laid the ball back to Chambers-Shaw who cracked off a 20 yard strike that went just wide. However, Bury were finally able to get past the Dereham defence in the 41st minute, courtesy of a set-piece goal, a Chambers-Shaw corner was nodded in by Hastings at the far post. Bury pushed to go in level pegging at half-time, but were only able to muster a 25yard strike from Jolland in injury time, that was always rising, and went narrowly over the bar.
After half-time, Bury came out as they had finished the first half, and had the majority of the possession and territory, but Dereham were proving to be very resilient. In the 51st minute, Ramadan fought his way through traffic, made space to shoot and fired in at near post, but his shot was pushed out for a corner by Dereham keeper Pride. In the 54th minute, a flick on from a throw-in almost saw Maughn in at the near post, but he was narrowly beaten to the ball.
Dereham were most definitely sitting back, in a compact formation, and looking to break quickly when the chance arose, and they beat the offside trap twice in quick succession. In the 57th minute, Dereham went route one, a big kick-out from keeper Pride was flicked on, Logan had timed his run well, beat the offside trap and was through on goal 1-on-1, but his side-footed was well stopped by Blair going down to his right, keeping Bury still in this game. In the 60th minute, Logan was through 1-on-1 again, from a long distance through ball from Hipperson, but before he could shoot, some last-ditch tracking back from the Bury defence prevented him from getting his shot off - Dereham were looking dangerous on the break.
Bury shored up their defence and began to dominate the game, and were able to create some good chances. In the 64th minute, a long left-to-right diagonal ball from Edwards was fired into the right of the box, Fenn nodded the ball towards the penalty spot for Ramadan, but his first time effort went over the bar. In the 66th minute another big long diagonal ball, this time from Hawkins, found Chambers-Shaw down the right, he took the ball into the box and looks to have been taken down for a strong penalty shout, but the ball broke to Ramadan and his snap shot beat keeper Pride but agonisingly slammed into the post and out.
In between the Bury chances, Logan got in again and managed to flash a shot wide, but Dereham sat deep, tight and compact and the flow of the game was punctuated by a myriad of substitutions. It took until the 80th minute until Bury fashioned another good chance, Hastings whipped a ball towards the penalty spot, Stafford charging in nearly got his head to it, but was just beaten by Pride, however his touch was poor and the ball fall to Fenn whose diving header looped over the keeper, but was agonisingly hooked away by Jarvis a yard in front of the goal-line. Bury had gone so close twice, but it was not to be. Despite chasing the game, that was their last good chance as Dereham shut up shop, and to add insult to injury, captain Fenn was sent off in the 93rd minute for his second yellow card of the night.
With that win, Dereham Town move up to an impressive 2nd place in the table. I thought that Bury Town were the better team for large parts of the game, but they looked frail at the back, and Dereham capitalised when mistakes were made, and they looked dangerous on the break. In contrast, Dereham proved to be really difficult to breakdown, and Bury struggled to carve out stone-cold opportunities, and Dereham were able to close out the game relatively comfortably, especially when captain Fenn was sent off for a second yellow card offence in the final minutes of the game. Bury have now lost two on the bounce, so will need to respond with a win against Romford at home on Saturday, and I think they did miss the young Ipswich Town loanees tonight. Dereham have the opportunity to cement their position near the summit of the table with an away trip to Brentwood Town, but they are also having a decent season so will be tough opposition indeed.
Line-Ups:
DEREHAM TOWN: Elliot Pride, Dion Frary, Jerry Dasaolu, Rossi Jarvis, Matt Castellan, Ashton Fox, Rhys Logan, Andrew Fisk, Shaun Bammant, David Hinton (C), Adam Hipperson. SUBS: Toby Hilliard, Robbie Linford, Adam Smith, Luke Johnson, Aaron Rickwood.
BURY TOWN: Sam Blair, Joe Hood, Ryan Stafford, Carlos Edwards, Ollie Fenn (C), Taylor Hastings, Jake Chambers-Shaw, Ryan Jolland, Ollie Hughes, Cemal Ramadan, Max Maughn. SUBS: Ryan Horne, Oli Snaith, Will Gardner.
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