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Wrexham play their reserve team games at the Globe Way Stadium, home of Buckley Town who play in the exotically-titled Huws Gray Fitlock Cymru Alliance football league. Buckley actually declined the invitation to join the Welsh Premier League for this season and you wonder how their club set-up could have coped at that level. The Flintshire ground is high above the town and has one small stand housing about seventy seats with the rest of the pitch just being touchline viewing only.
The Red Dragons named quite a strong line-up to face United this afternoon considering their first-team fought out a tough 2-2 draw away to Cheltenham Town yesterday evening. Strikers Jon Walters and Lee McEvilly played some part in the game today as the pair looked to improve their match fitness following recent injury problems.
The Blues, meanwhile, featured all three trialists, in Nicky Platt, Ben Christensen and Luke Joyce, following the good impression they made in the thumping 6-0 win for the United reserves at Rochdale on Monday night. There was no place however for Raphael Nade, who has recently returned from a loan spell with Weymouth, while Simon Hackney was also left out, presumably with the first team home game against Boston on Saturday in mind. Adam Murray started the game for the Cumbrians though as he looked for a hard run-out after the illness last weekend that had forced the midfielder to miss the 5-0 win at Darlington on Saturday afternoon.
The Cumbrians started the game firing on all cylinders and took the lead as early as the eighth minute when Rivers grabbed his first goal of the match with a tidy finish after a good spell of possession from United. Wrexham equalised quickly when McEvilly scored though, only for a goal from Glenn Murray and then another from Rivers taking Carlisle into a healthy 3-1 lead at the break.
The home side pulled the gap back to one goal again shortly after half-time when Walters hit home, only for Rivers to restore the two-goal advantage for the Blues soon afterwards, the ex-Crewe man slotting home following a nice individual run to claim the matchball for a hat-trick. Glenn Murray was eager to impress as well though and he bagged his second of the game late on to seal an excellent 5-2 away win for the United second-string.
Wrexham line-up :
Michael Jones, Phil Gray, Matthew Done, Simon Spender, Gareth Evans, Graham Roche, Marc Williams, Chris Evans, Jon Walters, Lee McEvilly, Alex Smith.
Substitutes :
Andy Fleming, Sion Edwards, Aaron Braisdell, Alex Darlington, Wes Baynes.
United line-up :
Anthony Williams, Luke Joyce, Ben Christensen, Simon Grand, Dan Kirkup, Nicky Platt, Brendan McGill, Adam Murray, Glenn Murray (Matthew Blake 70), Mark Rivers (Gary Baker 75), James Earl (Pete Ferris 50).
Unused substitute :
Adam Bradley.
That full house roll call in full :
First team - won 2-1 at home and 1-0 away.
Reserves - won 5-0 at home and 5-2 away.
Youth team - won 2-0 at home and 1-0 away.
Results in the division this week :
Rochdale 0-6 Carlisle (Monday evening)
Bury 3-3 Chester (Wednesday afternoon)
Wrexham 2-5 Carlisle (Wednesday afternoon)
Burnley 2-3 Rochdale (Wednesday evening)
Updated Reserve Team Table : Click here
Updated Reserve Team Results : Click here