The Town continued their good run of late with a resounding 7-0 victory over Winterbourne United.
Melksham secured their biggest Western League victory since a 8-1 thrashing of Barnstaple back in March 2007 with a resounding 7-0 victory over Winterbourne United which took the Town up to 9th place in the league.
With three changes from the previous Saturday’s victory over Longwell Green, Matt Cooper Leigh Rogers and Sayeed Ibrahim came into the starting line up as the Town utilised the full squad. The Town opened the game with a good tempo and after only two minutes Leigh Rogers shot over after a Gary Higdon pass, and on 13 minutes Ian Jeffery’s pass found Higdon whose first time cross was volleyed just over by Dan Kovacs. On 16 minutes the Town went ahead when skipper Dave Thompson headed a poor goal kick into the path of Higdon who calmly slotted home to put the home side 1-0 ahead.
As the Town continued to pour forward, Sheppard in the visiting goal made a smart save from a Higdon effort after a Rogers pass on 17 minutes, but the respite was short lived when Higdon found Kovacs and the striker rammed home the cross to put the Town 2-0 ahead on 21 minutes. However it was not all one way traffic by any means, as Winterbourne also started to push forward and Rendall missed a good opportunity to get them back in the game, when shooting over from 10 yards on 24 minutes, and Dowdell pulled his shot wide on 25 minutes when well placed. However the Town went 3-0 up on the half hour mark when Jeffery’s pass over the visitors back four gave Higdon a clear run on the goal and the striker continued his rich vein of form by knocking the ball over the keeper and slotting it home for his second of the game. The Town were creating chances at will and it came as no surprise that the Jeffery/Higdon partnership profited again on 35 minutes when the striker nodded a Jeffery corner into the net to get his second hat trick in consecutive games and put the home side 4-0 ahead.
Things got even better for the Town on 44 minutes when central defender Cooper nodded in a Benison corner to put the Town 5-0 ahead at the break, much to the delight of the home support.
At the interval Luke ‘Smudge’ Smith replaced Benison looking to get some match fitness, and almost immediately after the restart Thompson saw his shot saved from close range. As the game understandably slowed, Winterbourne, to their credit, began to enjoy some good possession, and Town management duo Darren Perrin and Dave Macey brought on Tom Stocks and Tom Robinson for Ryan Bennett and Dave Thompson to give the full squad some game time.
On 81 minutes the home side went 6-0 ahead when Jeffery found Rogers, and the youngster showed great composure to drill the ball past the over worked keeper, and on 85 minutes Will Stead and Tom Robinson combined to set up the irrepressible Higdon who knocked home his fourth of the evening to put the Town 7-0 ahead, and in doing so scored his 17th goal of the season, well on the way to matching the 37 goals he scored in the last campaign. In the dying seconds home keeper Tom Drewitt produced a fine save to keep out a Rendall effort to keep a clean sheet and secure a fine 7-0 victory and end a good evening for the Town.
