Slough 1 Poole Town 3 (29 August 2015)

Poole achieved an expected win at Slough in spite of a turgid first half and going behind just after half time. With Connell starting up front, Davidson coming in from the start and Roberts on the right wing it looked a different kind of set up from the Merthyr game and Poole were dominant in terms of possession in the first half. Brooks went close with a shot across goal and other shots came in from various Poole players. Roberts was hacked down when running through but generally Poole lacked the quality to penetrate the Slough defence. At the other end Slough manufactured several chances but didn't manage to take any of them. At half time the score was 0 - 0 and the shot count Slough 5 / Poole 6.

Just after half time the Poole defence was caught sleeping / appealing for offside and the ball was emphatically rammed home to give the lead to Slough. As we were recalling Bunyan's 'Slough of Despond' Devlin woke up, broke free and fired an unstoppable shot past the Slough keeper. He was booked shortly afterwards. The sharpness that Poole had been lacking in front of goal was emphasised when Gillespie replaced Connell and scored with virtually his first touch, getting to a ball running low across the goal before the defenders and deflecting the ball in.  Whisken received a yellow to add to his points tally for the season and a Slough defender was shown a straight red for hacking down Gillespie on a run which could have led to a goal. After that it was relatively easy for Poole and Brooks added a third just before the end. Second half shots Slough 4 / Poole 8.

Poole now lie just outside the play off positions, 5 points off the top of the table and look forward to the visit of Frome on Bank Holiday Monday and must hope to make further progress. The dolphins have still not reached the heights of last season's performances and still appear to lack cutting edge up front. With both centre backs under suspension soon the next few games will be interesting. Will Spetch came on for a cameo on the left wing before the end against Slough and looked ok. He may well be drafted in at centre back. I for one am looking forward to the return of Lewis Lindsay.