Bury Parts 1 + 3

Bury 3 Crewe 1

It is better to travel hopefully than to arrive, or something like that, and in the case of following Crewe this month, that's never been truer. Four games away from home, 15 goals conceded and no points earned. Still, I've had some good trips out.beers and dominoes at Northampton, meeting up with family at Rotherham and on Saturday a trip to Bury via a Wetherspoons pub and Taps Bar. Now Taps is a fantastic concept - you get a table which has two beer pumps on it and you can pour your own beer. The beer is charged in tenths of a pint and there's an electronic display so you can track how much beer you've had. Sadly, there are a couple of drawbacks with the concept - you're stuck with whatever is in the pumps on your table and some of the beers are quite expensive (£5.20 a pint in a couple of cases). That said, it was good fun pouring my own beer and if I was in the corporate hosting business I'd certainly look at using that venue to entertain clients. In fact, if my company ever strikes a big deal and takes us out to celebrate, I'll suggest that as a venue.
After the delights of a Wetherspoons breakfast (plus a pint of Roger The Cabin Boy and a pint of Master Bates, both from Nothumberland Brewery) and Taps bar, there was some faffery with taxis up to Bury and thence we were in the ground.
With Dario having decided to play all four of his strikers, there was a general consensus that it would either be a stroke of genius or a total disaster. In fact, in the first half, it didn't seem to be either. Both sides struggled to trouble the goal and neither keeper really had a save to make. Crewe did however manage to capitalise on their extra pace up front when a swift counter-attack saw Miller race on to a clever inside pass from Donaldson to take the ball in to the area and beat the keeper from just outside the six yard box. Almost out of nothing, and not far short of half-time, Crewe had the lead.
But they are Crewe and there were still plenty of anxious and nervous people in the crowd. Most of us couldn't believe that Crewe had nicked ahead, especially given the way they had played in previous matches. Bury didn't look particularly good but no one was counting any chickens...
Bury started the second half with all guns blazing but still couldn't find a way through the Crewe defence. Te ever dangerous Byron Moore had a good chance to put Crewe further ahead, but the keeper made a decent block. Bury came back again and Crewe started to look a little uncertain. On the hour mark, Bury manager Alan Knill made the substitutions that were to change the game. Off went the largely ineffective John-Lewis and Picken and on came the extra pace of Kyle Bennett and the battering ram of Andy Bishop (who usually scores against Crewe). Dario responded by swapping Moore for youngster Nick Powell, but the truth is that that wasn't what was needed. In my humble opinion, he should have brought on Murphy and shored up the midfield by going to a 4-4-2, with Moore on the left and Murphy on the right and Donaldson and Miller up front. With Bury starting to throw the numbers forward, the arrival of Bennett had an almost immediate impact. He found himself in space on the right of the penalty area and the ball fell to him and his instant cross-cum-shot caught out Tootle who could only bundle it over his own line for the equaliser. In short order Crewe were behind as their defence was again caught out by the movement of the front men of Bury. This time, Bennett was given time and space on the edge of the area to hit a shot past Taylor in the Crewe goal. Taylor could possibly have done better but he was probably a little unsighted when the shot was hit. Calamity was to follow calamity as Ryan Lowe found himself unmarked following some neat inter-passing on the edge of the are and he scored for the seventh consecutive game, to match a Bury record set some 57 years ago.  In little more than ten minutes Crewe had gone from leading and looking almost comfortable to trailing by two goals and chasing the game.
In truth, although they had chances Crewe never really looked like getting back in the game, but by the same token Bury never really looked like extending their lead. A mad fifteen minutes or so cost Crewe the game, but it was easy to see that once Bury scored their first, at least one more was going to come. Crewe's defence had the collywobbles and the midfield weren't tracking back quickly enough to cover their opposite numbers.
Ah well, that's February out of the way and there are a couple of nominally easier games to come so perhaps Crewe can find their form again and go on another run. With two months of the season left, automatic promotion maybe beyond them now but there's still the play-off spots to aim for. Fingers crossed.