Some of the visitors came in fancy dress including Flintstone costumes. Joy in Bedrock was short lived as an early goal for the visitors through Cameron Peters was disallowed for offside. Max Farrelly opened the scoring for Berko on 14 minutes and soon Sporting picked up a couple of bookings. Jonathan Lacey was pulled down in the penalty area enabling Matt Bateman to double the host’s lead on 22 minutes from the penalty spot. It was his 44th goal of the season in all competitions to set a new goal-scoring record for the modern club.
Brendan Kelly decided to bring on two substitutes at half time in a bid to get back in the game. It worked as soon after they scored from the penalty spot on 47 minutes, when Farrelly was judged to deliberately handball in the area and received his marching orders. Richard Gregory made no mistake from the spot.
As Didcot Town and Kempston Rovers have found out at Broadwater in recent weeks having a man advantage for much of the game does not simply lead to an away win. Xavi Comas- Leon did have to pull off quite a few saves but Berko looked good on the counter attack. Ben Spaul had to come off injured , so Karl Stevenson came on. Ashley Morrissey dribbled his way past several men before being chopped down but the free kick hit the wall from a dangerous position. Soon after Morrissey had to come off with a recurrent groin injury so Sam Nolan again became Berko’s second youth team player on the pitch slotting into defence alongside James Hutchins.
Lacey was proving tricky on the break and whilst Jon Brown did well to save a couple of his shots, he was powerless when Berko scored their third goal. In the 86th minute Lacey beat his man on the left and rounded Brown and fired in a good shot to seal the three points at the canal end.
When the sides met earlier in the season it was a 3-3 draw, so Berko are the only side in the division that Bromsgrove did not beat in the league this season. Unfortunately, news came through that Dunstable Town had lost at Sutton Coldfield Town. That meant relegation for the Beds side and that Sutton Coldfield Town finished fifth, just pipping Berko to the last spot in the end of season play offs, for which the reward was a midweek trip to play Bromsgrove.
Berko: Comas-Leon; Towell, Murphy, Spaul, Hutchins, Farrelly, Collier, Brooks ,Bateman, Lacey, Morrissey (Nolan). Subs not used - Weatherill, Bircham & Godfre |