By Mark Doig at Park View Road
VICTORY over Wingate & Finchley took Welling United up to second place in the Isthmian League Premier Division and extended their unbeaten home run.
Ryan Maxwell’s team have won nine and drawn one of their league and cup games at Park View Road since last been beaten on home soil at the end of February.
After five consecutive derbies, with the last two being FA Cup games, it was back to the bread and butter of normal league matches and the Wings enjoyed a convincing victory.
Fumnaya Shomotun had already fired over and Sam Smith hit a deflected shot that looped onto the bar before the Wings went ahead in the fifteenth minute. Smith delivered a low corner that Zak O’Keefe met on the half-volley and fired home.
The one-way traffic continued and Nahum Melvin-Lambert had a close-range finish disallowed despite it looking as though he had timed his run perfectly to meet a diagonal cross from Demaray Anyadike.
There was then almost a carbon copy of the goal when O’Keefe met another Smith corner on the half-volley but, this time it flew wide of the near post.
The visitors shocked the Wings with an equaliser three minutes before half-time. Nathan Bertram-Cooper cleared off the line from John Shamalo and Scott Kashket was first to the rebound to force it over the line.
At half-time, Maxwell made a change and Ryan Kingsford started the second period replacing the unwell Melvin-Lambert. The substitute almost made a quick impact when his volley from Ryan Blackman’s deep cross brought an excellent reaction save out of goalkeeper Charlie Grainger.
Another substitution on the hour-mark did pay immediate dividends. Welling had been awarded a free-kick for a foul on Kingsford when Jamie Reynolds came on for Smith. He raced straight over to take it and struck it inside the far post.
Four minutes later, Welling scored again when Kaan Bennett caught Grainger dithering and nicked it away. Although the goalkeeper got a hand on Bennett’s effort, it flew across to Kingsford and he poked it home from close range.
In the visitors’ only real moment of danger in the second period, former Welling captain Jack Thomas missed a great chance when a Sam Cornish cross skimmed off his forehead and went wide.
That could have made it interesting but instead, Welling scored a fourth. Reynolds took a short corner to Kingsford, received it back, and crossed to the far post where an unmarked Bennett headed home for his first Welling goal.
The Wings missed further chances but it didn’t matter as they saw the game out to record a comfortable victory in front of their happy supporters.
Welling United: Foley; O’Keefe, Majoyegbe, Bertram-Cooper, Arthur; Blackman (Miller-Rodney 73); Anyadike (Otseh-Taiwo 80), Smith (Reynolds 60), Shomotun (Howard 60); Bennett; Melvin-Lambert (Kingsford 46).
Substitutes not used: None.
