Derby delight for City as they twice come from behind to down Bluebirds
City twice came from a goal down to beat Chippenham Town 3-2 in an action packed A4 derby at Twerton Park this afternoon. City got off to the worse possible start when on five minutes former Roman George Rigg fired home from 30 yards to give the Bluebirds the lead. Five minutes later Andy Watkins limped from the action with an ankle injury. However, moments later a lung-bursting run almost the length of the pitch by Adam Mann ended with his shot hitting the foot of the post and less than another minute passed before Mann turned Alex Hartridge’s cross back to Ryan Brunt to level from four yards out. City looked in control of the game now as Chippenham struggled to cope with their passing and movement but on 21 minutes the visitors regained the lead when Owen-Evans’ cross evaded everyone to find the top corner of the net. Despite this City continued on the front foot although Ryan Clarke had to be alert on 38 minutes to block Owen-Evans’ close-range effort. If City felt any sense of injustice at being behind at the interval within nine minutes of the restart they deservedly levelled when Mann converted Hartridge’s cross. Three minutes later Chippenham were reduced to ten men when Tyler received his second booking but for a spell after this City’s passing got sloppy and the Wiltshire side enjoyed their best spell of the game. Pratt and Zebroski both failed to test Clarke and with 12 minutes left Joe Raynes burst into the box to fire past Puddy and put City in front for the first time. And they saw out the remainder of the game with few scares to secure the three points and move up to 3rd place in the Vanarama National League South table, now just five points behind leaders Wealdstone.