Cradley Town 0-0 Sutton United
Saturday 13 January 2024

It was good to be back on home soil for the first time since Boxing Day. Cold and bright it was. Our visitors Sutton United (sixth in the table) from Sutton Coldfield had a phenomenal away record. They lost their first away game of the season 4-1 at Heather St John's and hadn't lost a league game away since then, having drawn 5 at places like Hinckley AFC and OJM Black Country, and won 4 at places like Droitwich Spa and Coventry Copsewood. They'd conceded only 7 goals in those 9 games!

We were really hoping to dent that amazing record but now, after our goal-less draw, they are ten away league games undefeated and have conceded only 7 goals in 10 games.

Sutton came at us strongly in the opening stages of the game and their striker Joe Gildea had a good chance to add to the massive 25 goals he’d already scored but, much to his frustration, he tapped the ball tamely into the hands of our keeper Nana Frimpong.

Then on 13 minutes our popular goalkeeper Nana Frimpong had to pull off a great save to push Tom Massey’s dipping shot over his crossbar.

The Hammers soon started to impose themselves on the game though and between then and the final whistle we had umpteen chances to score but, at the moment, our forwards are unable to find top gear.

Credit must also go to the Sutton defence who worked very hard and snuffed out many of our moves. It must be said too that the Brummies also had their moments when they had our defence worried.
On 32 minutes we Cradley fans thought the ball was in our net but Harry Edwards and Nana Frimpong just managed to keep the ball away from the challenging Joe Gildea.

Second half

Just five minutes into the second period we home fans were worried to see our striker Jordan Crump pull up with a hamstring problem as he raced down our right wing. We hope this does not prove to be too serious an injury but Jordan had to go off being replaced by Cameron Milne.

After this, the Hammers had even more possession than in the first half but sadly the Sutton keeper had far less to do with many of our moves coming to nothing.

On the hour mark, Sam Banner came on as a left winger in place of Casey Collins and, with his lightning pace, promised to make a break-through on several occasions but he was closely marked by the away right back Jon Grigg who invariably came out on top in their duels.

By this stage, it seemed the Brummies were content with a draw as their players went down frequently needing treatment from their physio, usually accompanied by cat-calls from the crowd.

The danger of a break-away was always there though and our central defender Dan Hadley took one for the team when he pulled back an opponent near the half-way line on 83 minutes. This was the only yellow card in the game as the referee allowed play to proceed without the necessity of showing a card all the time and both sets of players responded well, taking knocks and tackles with no histrionics whatsoever.

A home goal right at the end of the game would have been a thing of joy for the Hammers fans but on 96 minutes yet another Cradley free kick went into the box and out past the far post with no one getting a touch on it and the game was over.

That was the first time Cradley had been in a goal-less game since March 2022 when we drew 0-0 here against Wednesfield. The point keeps us in second place on goal difference from Ingles. Heather St John’s, OJM Black Country and Wednesfield also stay hot on our tails after good wins but Droitwich Spa lost 2-1 at Wolves Sporting thanks to goals from our former players Jack Arnold and Sam Baxter.

Cradley: Nana Frimpong, Harry Edwards, Declan Bibb, Jamie Underhill, Dan Hadley, Darren Whitley ©, Casey Collins (Sam Banner 60), Brad Ward, Chris Bladen (Kane Harrold 67), Jordan Crump (Cameron Milne 50), Josh Marsden. Subs not used: Dan Harvey and Sam Smith.