King's Lynn 2 Wealdstone 1
11th September 1971
LYNN scrambled shakily to their second. Southern League Division One win on Saturday when they beat league newcomers Wealdstone at The Walks.Two goals early in the second half made it four points out of a possible four - but Lynn are living dangerously.
For the second successive week they fell behind in the first five minutes and then spent the rest of the half trying to live the mistake down.
Then straight. after the interval they had a slice of luck when ex-Linnet Cliff Jones could have put Wealdstone two ahead, probably a winning margin.
Team manager Mick Wright. commented later: "I do not think we played particularly well but we got the result in the end. We are still making it hard for ourselves; we let in an early goal and then we had a lot of pressure and we could have been ahead by half time. In the end there was some luck attached to the two goals we got, but we could have scored from a number of other chances."
Bright spots for Wealdstone came in the first five minutes and then in the last seconds. They took the lead in the fourth minute through centre forward GARY TOWNEND who punished a moment's hesitation by Peter Robinson by taking the ball and steering his shot wide of Gary Steel.
This meant that once again Lynn faced a hard uphill struggle.
They had chances to get back, a poor Wealdstone free kick being headed back by Keith Rudd straight to Malcolm Lindsay who shot wide; then to the 19th minute Mickie Bloxham in front of an open goal was unable to get the ball under control.
Big let-off for Lynn after the re-start came when Mick Brown squared the ball across Lynn's goal and Jones side-footed his shot towards the net only to see Townend block the effort as effectively at any defender could have done.
Jones showed few touches of class and little enthusiasm for the game, while the other former Lynn player Dixie Hale was right out of touch.
And back went Lynn, pounding relentlessly at the Wealdstone defence. There was not a great deal of originality in their play, but eventually Wealdstone cracked.
In the 57th minute a raking pass from mid-field was chased by Lindsay and Bill Bailey, with Barr coming out to meet them. BAILEY got his foot to the bail first and rolled it past Barr for the equaliser.
Ten minutes later LINDSAY went to take Lynn's 13th corner. His inswinger from the left dipped into the goalmouth, Burr and Bloxham went up together and the ball ended the net.
Who gets the credit for it? Lynn are putting forward Lindsay as the scorer.
Wealdstone came out more after this with Watson and Brown getting in worthwhile shots. But the main action did not come until the last minute, when at one end Brooks had a shot tipped over, then at the other Ricketts and Steel blocked possible equalising shots by Mahon and Townend.
Lynn: Steel; Ricketts, Radcliffe, Robinson, Painter; Wright, Brooks, Clarke , Rudd, Lindsay, Bloxham (Sub. Kerr).
Attendance: 1,055.