Clevedon Town were involved in a nine-goal thriller with Chippenham Town under-23s, which saw the Seasiders defeated 6-3 at the Everyone Active 3G on Monday night.
Without a Toolstation Western League Division One game over the New Year weekend, Town manager Alex White organised a practice match against the young Bluebirds.
Chippenham grabbed the lead after only 25 seconds when Raza Alamu pounced on a loose ball and cut in from the left to shoot into the far corner of the net past goalkeeper Luca Smith.
Clevedon equalised on 27 minutes when Chippenham goalkeeper Kyle Cooke could only punch a Clevedon corner straight up and Alex Kemsley got enough on the ball with his follow-up header from close range to score.
With their tails up Clevedon took the lead five minutes later when Alex Camm’s ball in following a free-kick was volleyed in by Ollie Babington.
The lead lasted only another five minutes when Ola Lawal was tripped from behind by Kemsley and Joel Smeadley stepped up with a well struck penalty into the corner of the net.
The hosts retook the lead after 50 minutes when Ethan Feltham’s powerful shot was pushed round the post for a corner by Cooke and when the ball came in from the free-kick Archie Heywood just got in front of Cooke to head the ball goalwards and into the top corner to make it 3-2.
Feltham almost made it four when he robbed Cooke on 73 minutes but saw his shot cleared off the line and Chippenham immediately made Clevedon pay when moments later Bradbury’s mishit shot found its way past the unsighted Lovell into the net to move the visitors level.
From there on Chippenham powered on to win when Alamu’s powerful strike into the far corner put them 4-3 up.
Dan Ware then got himself two goals in five minutes, the first he headed in a cross by Noah Copping after 85 minutes and in added time latched on the end of another through ball by Copping to go round Lovell to score.
"It was a good exercise where the result was secondary, and we wanted to give some minutes to the squad," said White.
"I was pleased that we played some good football, the under-18s who came in did well and the score aside it was a productive evening.’
Looking forward he added, ‘we’re now good to go against Mousehole on Saturday which we’re really looking forward after the game down there, which was one of the best Toolstation Western League games I have seen."
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