Three Bridges clinch play-off place with Erith victory

It wasn’t the most fluent performance, but after an early header by Rob Strachan was cleared off the line, the visitors were rarely troubled by their relegation threatened hosts.

Bridges finally got into their stride after eight minutes when they won a corner, Brannon O’Neill’s delivery being brilliantly met by a powerful header from leading scorer Noel Leighton for the opener.

Nabeel Ghannam and Kevin Rivera were constant threats to Erith’s defence, but Cameron Andrews should have done better with a free kick whilst Leo Anderson blocked a rare Macey Malyon effort with his knees.

A great move involving Dan Ferreira, Leighton and Rivera ended with the latter seeing his final effort cleared off the line, whilst the ensuing batch of four successive corners ended with another Leighton header being cleared off the line too.

Ibrahim Jalloh made a surging run but shot straight at keeper Jordan Gillmore, but with ten minutes remaining O’Neill’s cross to the far post was headed down by the excellent Tresor Difika to leave Jalloh with a simple tap into the open goal and the side were guaranteed at worse fifth place in the table.

Erith: J.Gillmore, M.Holness, D.Martin, R.Morley (E.Cheeseman, 88), R.Strachan, B.Parkinson, C.Andrews, B.French, M.Malyon, D.Parkinson (M.Manktelow, 88), M.Neary (K.Alyanyo, 60).

Bridges: L.Anderson, D.Ferreira, R.Euba, T.Difika, C.Donaghey, B.Villavicencio, I.Jalloh, B.O’Neill, N.Leighton, K.Rivera, N.Ghannam.

Unused Subs. - E.Hanslow, S.Agun, A.Adam, J.Bendall, B.Irving.

Booked - Ferreira (64), O’Neill (68), Leighton (76), Anderson (90+2).

Bridges Man of the Match - Dan Ferreira.

This Saturday sees Bridges last home game of the season with Sevenoaks Town as the visitors.

ALF BLACKLER