Frome Town were overwhelmed by an impressive Bath City side in their penultimate pre-season friendly. Though the Robins competed bravely for the majority of the ninety minutes at Badgers Hill, the National League South side flexed their muscle and chalked up five goals, two from substitute Sol Wanjau-Smith, after an unpleasant injury to winger Reece Rusher.
It continues to be a tough ask against their urban neighbours who have played in the tier above for thirteen consecutive season, but Frome looked lively in the first half. On ten minutes, the Robins’ trialist, starting up front alongside James Ollis and Marcus Day, surged forward after a Joe Budd interception. He was possibly offside, though no flag was raised, but the crucial touch was slightly heavy and the Romans’ keeper, Harvey Wiles-Richards, was brave enough to come and snaffle the ball before a meaningful attempt on goal could be gotten away.
Will Taylor found space to run into on the right but his neat cross could only find the foot of centre-back Jack Batten, prowling on the edge of the box as the Robins pushed hard. Scott Wilson’s opener for the visiting side just after twenty minutes could be argued to have gone against the run of play. Winger Ewan Clark bent his run along the edge of the box before threading a darting shot through the crowd of defenders that were blocking Kyle Phillips’ view. Despite a whiff of offside, Wilson, as he so often is, was in the right place at the right time to tip it in.
Jerry Gill’s side had enjoyed their pre-season up to this point, the highlight of which had been victory over EFL side Port Vale a fortnight ago. After securing the lead, the black-and-white shirts were in control for the remainder of the half, though the Frome defence were dependable when called upon. With a few minutes of the first-half to see out, the Robins were unfortunate to not finish the first forty-five minutes on level pegging, forward Day winning and delivering a free-kick from a handy position just outside the box to the left. The set-piece was all but perfect, taking a nick of one of the bodies in the box but, crucially, crashing into the post.
The second-half was witness to more brilliance from Marcus Day - how many times are the Frome fans are going to say that this season! He hooked the ball out to Budd on the wing, received the pass in, and skipped into the box to shoot only to find the side-netting. The home side had come out of the break looking up for it, launching stylish attacks, manoeuvring themselves into the visitor’s box as red shirts aplenty pressured the Bath defenders.
A triple substitution at half-time saw the arrival of Rusher, whose stint on the pitch was ended just ten minutes or so later when a cloddish challenge saw the winger slump to the ground and immediately call for assistance with a panicked wave. Despite this, the referee and Bath played on to the ire of the BA11 faithful before the ball was played out. It was clearly serious, physios from both sides tending to the injury-plagued player and a stretcher being brought out soon after. Rusher was carried out to applause but the prognosis was not a favourable one. We wish him well!
Whether the image of their teammate in distress contributed to Frome’s drop-off in intensity over the last twenty minutes, one can make up their own mind but it is justifiable grounds for the late flurry of conceded goals. Wanjau-Smith notched up a brace of goals off the bench and a couple of assists to boot, punishing a defence miscue and placing his shot just out of the way of Kyle Phillip’s gloves for the first and leaping athletically to head in his second. Signed that day, Zac Smith collected Wanjau-Smith’s pinpoint pass behind the defensive line to score from point-blank range and, running in from deep, Jordan Alves did similar for the fifth and final score to cap a performance from Bath where possession football was the name of the game.
It was maybe not the performance over the full ninety that the crowd of 365 at the Hill might have expected, but there was plenty of positives to take from a fixture that the Robins were not expected to win. Defeats by five goals will not be the norm in the Southern Prem, but canny opposition who might starve Frome of possession may be a predictable theme as the BA11 make the step up. If that is the case, this was an evening where Danny Greaves’ side looked capable enough to go toe-to-toe with sides who base their success on keeping the ball and Swansea City’s U21s will no doubt pose a similar challenge in the last pre-season friendly at home next Saturday.
Match report and live updates provided by Zeb Baker-Smith
If you need more insight into the ninety minutes, have a listen to the latest episode of BA11's very own podcast as Steve and Zeb report live from Badgers Hill and striker James Ollis gives us his talking points ahead of the league season..
Now the fixture list is out and the tickets for the first couple of months of home fixtures are ready for purchase, you can secure entry in advance on the FanBase app and website (link below) alongside admission to our final pre-season friendly at home against Swansea City U21s the following Saturday!
A
Fan's View from T'he Hill.'
Nice one Zeb,
good crowd of 500’ish on a beautiful Caribbeanesque evening at ‘The Hill’ poured out of our solitary turnstile, spewing to all directions of the town, all in a rather disconsolate mood just after the final whistle. I too was rather disconsolate I have to say, to discover that my ,Corner Flag’ pasty had doubled in price to £4! I’d have got 2 for that last year! This before a ball had even been kicked in anger. So, I was suffering from the new medical condition of ‘PPP’ - Premium Pasty Prices.
We bumped into poor old Lester Silk (supporters club chairman) and he has done his ligaments - possibly turning too sharply in…