X Roads 2

St David’s 1

X Roads withstood a late rally to hold onto a hard-fought victory over previously unbeaten St David’s in the FA Cup preliminary round at Garrison Field.

The home side were seemingly cruising towards victory after first-half goals from Aaron Spencer and Antinori Butterfield until Diego McCallan pulled one back for St David’s five minutes from time to set up a nervous finish.

With the game wide open, McCallan twice went close to grabbing an equaliser for the visiting side.

First, he dragged a shot inches wide of the far post, and then crashed another effort against the crossbar.

However, St David’s spirited fightback came up short as the home side held on for a well-deserved victory.

“It was a good result and a good performance,” Khomeini Talbot, the X Roads vice-president, said. “The key was fighting hard, the guys fought hard from the opening whistle to the end.

“The guys just kept fighting and I thought that was the difference today.”

Spencer broke the deadlock in the 23rd minute when he latched onto a through ball, shrugged off a tackle and buried his effort in at the near post.

Butterfield then doubled the home side’s advantage two minutes before the interval when he chipped the goalkeeper to apply the finishing touches to a well-executed counter attack.

St David’s were better organised in the second half and after making a few tactical changes began to get a foothold in the match.

The pressure eventually told when McCallan pounced after being afforded too much time and space on the edge of the box, placing his shot inside the bottom corner.

X Roads blew two glorious chances to kill the game off and nearly paid the price in the final minutes.

“We haven’t been happy with our performances so far and this is probably one of our better hard-fought victories,” Talbot said.

“This win will give us more confidence, especially after our setback last week [against Southampton Rangers] when we had a lead and let it slip. This week we had a lead and didn’t let it slip, so that’s probably the best thing about this result.”