Pierrepont keeps Linby at bay in rare home defeat

It was Linby’s second loss at home this season, going down 3-1 to their Derbyshire opponents.

They have played far worse and won games this season.

Linby boss Lewis Saxby had a headache with five defenders and influential skipper Aidy Harris injured.

Saxby gave a debut to 16-year-old centre-back Steve Johnson-Fikula.

On Saturday they came up against a very youthful looking Matlock reserve team, who were very good on the counter.

It didn’t help matters that Matlock’s goalkeeping delivered the best performance by a visiting keeper for many years.

Matlock started the game well and could have gone ahead early if it were not for 17-year-old full-back Ed Heginbotham’s goal-line clearance.

Nothing could stop them minutes later when Tom Savage met a cross from the right and headed into Josh Downie’s bottom corner.

Matlock’s keeper Jordan Pierrepont made his first of a string of fine stops to deny Tremere Lindos.

But there was nothing he could do to deny Jamie Tryner drilled shot after Lewis Weaver had latched on to a loose throw-in.

Pierrepont saved twice more from Weaver, Matt Murphy, Steff Cobb and Weaver again early in the second hlaf.

Linby stopper Downie pulled off a good save of his own to deny Savage but the rebound fell kindly to Lee Jordan to make it 2-1 to Matlock.

Weaver was again denied by Pierrepont, Jordan O’Callaghan’s shot deflected onto the post and Linby had that funny old feeling it wasn’t going to be their day.

Another Matlock counter-attack made sure of the points, Savage twisting the knife late on to make it 3-1.