UEA DEFEAT DERBY

UEA opened the scoring from a swift counter-attack following a Derby corner. Rerizani, who had the beating of the right-back every time, was released on the left and raced into the box squaring for Blackwell to fire home from close range.

UEA came close to doubling their lead from a free-kick which was a result of a horrific looking tackle on left-back Harle. It looked deserving of a yellow card at least but the referee kept the cards in his pocket; the resultant free-kick was whipped over the wall clipping the outside of the post.

It was two soon after though as Rerizani again found joy down the left, his cross was spilt by the away keeper and Beeson capitalised firing home to double the home advantage.

Derby were not offering a great deal going forward and it looked as though the floodgates may have been opened as UEA made it three in quick succession. This time from a corner as Hastings met the cross at the far post to put UEA three up at the interval.

The first half wasn’t a classic, scrappy at times, but as we’ve seen this season UEA had been clinical in the opposition final third giving them a commanding lead.

UEA started the second half as they had ended the first and made it 4-0 almost instantly. Blackwell released down the right saw the keeper off his line and beat him with a sumptuous chip.

It had been all UEA pressure up until the hour mark when Derby grabbed one back from a rare foray forward. An orange shirt found space in the box to put a ball across the face of goal which was neatly back heeled into the far corner.

Warning bells started to ring five minutes later as Derby grabbed a second in what seemed a very unlikely comeback at the halfway stage. Derby had a man over on the left who cut inside the area and curled his shot into the far corner.

Derby came close to further reducing the deficit as they capitalised on a wasteful UEA throw which resulted in a one on one with the keeper. Luckily for UEA the Derby forward saw his effort agonisingly rebound of the post when he really should have scored.

The frenetic nature of the match continued with Derby winning a penalty as the referee deemed a UEA push worthy of a spot-kick. Savage though won the battle between keeper and taker as he made a fine stop down to his left.

UEA had a glorious chance to put the game to bed after the penalty miss. Looking for a response UEA came forward and a cross picked out Blackwell but the striker could not direct his header on target.

The killer goal came soon after however, Blackwell latched onto a ball over the top making no mistake with his finish this time, firing across the keeper to make it five and completing his hat-trick.

That was the end of the goals but not the end of the action, in a game that could and probably should have seen several cards already the referee finally went to his pocket with a minute to go. First a late UEA tackle resulted in yellow which they could rightly feel aggrieved about considering several equally misjudged tackles from Derby going unpunished.

Heading in to the 90^th minute there was still time for a red, a petulant off the ball kick by a Derby man was spotted by the linesman and rightly warranted a red card reducing the away team to ten.

UEA were in command bar a twenty minute spell which but for the width of the post and an excellent penalty save could have seen a much different outcome. Derby’s finishing let them down though and UEA were able to kill the game off to open their BUCS account with three points.