Nailers come from behind In dramatic home victory

The Nailers went into the game off the back of five games without losing and after losing to Market Drayton earlier in the season, Belper would have felt that they needed to right what they did wrong in their 1-0 away defeat.

This almost seemed as if it would be easy for Belper, with Market Drayton having lost their last four games in a row including a 5-0 defeat to Sheffield last time out, but it would be anything but simple for Belper.

It started in the worst way possible for the Nailers when they went behind just 7 minutes in, Jud Ellis almost walked through the Belper defence with no challenge, he then slid the ball across to Shaquille Whittingham who had the simplest of finishes to give Market Drayton the lead.

This came just minutes after Ellis’ shot hit the crossbar to give the Nailers an early shock to the system.

This terrible start by Belper continued as Market Drayton hit the bar once again, this time Glyn Coney’s deflected effort hit the top of the bar to give the Nailers a certain fright.

Just before the break Jud Ellis hit the cross bar once more, his shot from distance seemingly came out of nowhere before deflecting out of play.

The Nailers had next to no attempts on goal, with a display of poor passing and decision making that they most certainly would not have been happy going into the half time break a goal down.

A double substitution seemed to help make the difference for the Nailers, with Matt Richards and Will Dennis entering the field in place of Dominic Allen and Sam Birks.

Market Drayton would have rued not getting more goals after their wealth of chances in the first half, when just six minutes into the second half Alex Steadman got an equaliser for the Nailers.

As the ball was played back to Ashley Rawlins in the Market Drayton goal, Steadman closed him down to try and regain possession, the forward slid in to push the ball towards the empty net, the ball rolled over the line to bring the game level.
Steadman continued his excellent second half performance by creating the goal to put the Nailers in the lead, he made an excellent run down the left before finding Evan Garnett who had found some great space in the box. Garnett finished with ease as the Nailers went in front.

It seemed as if Belper were going to hold on to a simple 2-1 win until in the 93rd minute, Phil Watt brought a player down in a crowded penalty area as the referee pointed to the penalty spot.

Jud Ellis stepped up to convert the spot kick but Danny Haystead pulled out a heroic save to confirm all 3 points for the Nailers who have now climbed to 6th in the league.