Wednesday March 6th 2013 Slough Town Home RIC Wednesday 6th March 2013 Red Insure Cup Semi Final Frome Town 2 Slough Town 1 Frome Scorers: Clark (28), Bryant (33) Slough Scorers: O’Toole (19) Crowd: 149 Star Man: Luke Ballinger Entertainment Value: 4 A good all round performance from Frome Town saw them progress to the final of the Red Insure Cup thanks to two goals from new signings Matt Clark and Mitchell Bryant, though Slough Town could consider themselves a little unlucky not to have taken this match to extra time. With Salisbury City loan signing Matt Clark starting at number 6 and new signing Mitch Bryant straight into the line up at number 9, the match started brightly, with both sides creating chances early on. Frome’s Matt Smith rose to an 8th minute corner and headed the ball onto the top of the Slough cross bar, but it was Slough who took the lead in the 19th minute as a fine curling ball put Ryan O’Toole clean through the Frome defence and he finished well by shooting low under Darren Chitty and into the net. Frome responded well and some good inter passing led to Matt Clark hitting a low 25 yard shot into the corner of the net to equalise the scores in the 28th minute. Mitch Bryant was starting to impress as he brought some physical presence to the role of centre forward, and with Luke Ballinger having his best game since returning to the Club, things were now starting to happen, and as Ballinger ran onto an excellent ball from Smith, he pulled the ball back low into the penalty area where Bryant did what a good centre foreward should do and thumped the ball into the net. Though behind, Slough always looked dangerous in the first half, and they were extremely unlucky in the 42nd minute as a 25 yard free kick was hit beautifully by O’Toole, the ball curled over the wall, hit the underside of the bar, came down, bounced up and was cleared by a defender, and even the partisan Frome supporters behind the goal agreed that the ball was over the line, but it wasn’t awarded and Frome went into the break leading 2-1. The second half started in a pattern that was to last for most of the the half, with Slough playing a high line and looking to play in the Frome half, but Frome always looking dangerous on the break. The Frome defence and midfield coped well with the Slough pressure and Chitty was rarely brought into serious action. A short corner in the 67th minute saw Ballinger burst through and go very close with a deflected shot, and a couple of minutes later Ballinger and Bryant combined well to set up a shooting chance for Smith, but the ball cleared the bar. Substitute Lloyd Matthews had a golden chance to seal the win as a through ball saw him clean through the Slough defence, he advanced on goal and went round James Hawtree, but a good touch by the keeper deflected the ball away from goal, the chance went and a heavy tackle on Matthews as he tried to retrieve the ball led to a yellow card for a Slough defender. Slough kept looking for the equaliser right up until the final whistle, but it wouldn’t come and Frome now move into a two legged final with Arlesey, meaning that they will play a team that has progressed to the first round proper of this season’s FA Cup in both the semi final and final of the Red Insure Cup.   The  “H&B Tyres Man of the Match” award was awarded to Luke Ballinger by Jamie Malley of Sandstone Media who had sponsored the match, and it was good to see him taking players on and making things happen again. Frome Town Slough Town Officials I Parsons R Cockle A Fricker Match Photos Photos of this match taken by our expert photographer Chas Hadfield can be viewed by clicking on this rectangle Match Sponsor Sandstone Media Ball Sponsor Roxi Meaden James Hawtree Sean Fraser Danny Murphy Adam Martin Adam Logie Dave Woozley Jake Parsons Dave Deeney Danny Burnell Ryan O’Toole Joe Chandiram Ashley Deeney Alex Brown Sam Bateman Ollie Burgess Steve Sinclair