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 Match Report
Cambridge United 0 Bury 1
Nationwide League Division 2
Saturday 12th August 2000
David Beckham's long-range lob at Selhurst Park, Gustavo Poyet's volley at Stamford Bridge - the opening game of the football season has sometimes exploded into life with an awesome strike - potential goals of the season before the season has really begun.
Yet Paul Barnes' scrappy, untidy, scrambled goal two minutes before the break at the Abbey Stadium will have meant just as much to Bury manager Andy Preece and his players as any goal - it gave them three away points which they undeniably deserved. After moving ahead in such instantly forgettable style, the Shakers, lining up with a three-man forward line of Littlejohn, Barnes and Preece, could have bagged more goals but for the stubborness of U's goalkeeper Lionel Perez, the Frenchman blocking Adrian Littlejohn's header in the second half after Ian Ashbee cleared Paul Reid's shot off the line. As it was, they entered the final stages of the game with a rearguard, counter-attacking action, as United were gifted nine minutes injury time in which to draw level, following the injury to their captain Paul Wanless who was stretchered away with a blood-red cloth held firmly to a head wound.
Prior to his accidental smash with Andy Preece at a corner, Wanless had been denied an equaliser when he fired both of Cambridge's best two opporunities of the half at Bury 'keeper Patrick Kenny - meeting a deep free-kick at the back post already airborne, but volleying at Kenny who made a good save. Then hitting the rebound goalwards before Kenny again snapped into action, quickly blocking and holding the shot down at his near post. It was Kenny's second important save of the match. Earlier, in the first half with the scores deadlocked, Alex Russell had cracked a left-footed effort towards the roof of the net, when Kenny got his hands to the ball to punch it skywards before claiming it at the second attempt.
Bury moved ahead through Barnes though just before the break, and his opener was the result of a spell of Shakers pressure. Chris Billy squandered two chances, one inside the box and the other just outside, with lazy, miscued efforts, while eventual goalscorer Barnes blazed over from inside the six yard box on two occasions after planting a firm header just over the crossbar in the first five minutes. When the goal finally arrived, it was claimed by Barnes after he seemed to head the ball home from his position on the line. Andy Preece had been involved, and there was a suspicion that Adrian Littlejohn had knocked the ball out of Perez's hands, but Bury grabbed the goal and eventually held out admirably to a win in the draining heat.
by Ben Walker
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