○Verwood Town2–2Andover Town

Little to choose between the two 'Town' teams in the opening quarter of an hour, perhaps Verwood can count themselves unlucky when a rasping shot from James Guthrie rattled the crossbar in the fifth minute, writes Mike Robins.

Verwood had settled first and had further opportunities to open their account with Matt Vining beaten by a bounce after indecision in the visiting defence and an Ollie Davies run- shrugging off a couple of challenges but Andover keeper Karl Steinborn-Busse was equal to the finish. Andover gave away a penalty on 26 minutes after a controversial decision. Trapnell went shoulder to shoulder with the Verwood forward Otho then appeared to trip over the ball with Trapnell a yard or two away. Nevertheless, it was VINING who stepped up and converted to give the Potters the lead. That lead didn’t last long though. A good build up down the right flank saw MICHAEL OWEN capitalise when a low cross in somehow got to him at the far post and he made no mistake from close in. Towards the latter stages of the half, the visitors had spells of pressure with the hosts unable to clear their lines.

HT Verwood Town 1-1 Andover Town

Billy Cooper tested Steinborn-Busse barely three minutes after the resumption but his rising shot zipped beyond the upright. George Higgins was unlucky to see his shot from near the penalty spot dropped by Peter O’Connor but nobody from Andover was alert and the hosts managed to clear the danger. However on the hour mark they edged ahead; a low delivery from Brendan Holmes saw DAVID JERRARD net with a free header from about eight yards, they came close to a third moments later. Andover were dominating and you sensed the only chance for home side would be through a mistake and within a couple of minutes it was all square again, when DAVIES was able to restore parity after a sliced clearance. Now, if the game ended on 75 minutes the result was probably a fair one- with the game being end to end, but the last fifteen saw Verwood hanging on for a draw with the visitors wasting a number of chances or being kept at bay by some determined defending.