FA Cup Preliminary Round
Max Banner reports from the Victoria Ground
BROMSGROVE Sporting’s dreams of a mouth-watering FA Cup tie against Redditch United were crushed on Saturday as a rampant Hinckley ran out emphatic winners.
The visitors set the tone with a goal from Luke Richards inside the opening seven minutes and it became an uphill battle for Bromsgrove when Simon Fitter saw red.
Sam Wills levelled matters, but that was close as they got as Nathan Walker, Jean Kalenda and Marco Adaggio struck to open up a 4-1 lead.
Richards grabbed his second before Adaggio completed the rout after Josh McKenzie scored a late consolation.
From the off, Hinckley made their presence felt and quickly opened the scoring, with Richards slotting the ball into the bottom corner.
Despite this early sucker punch, Sporting were fairly quick to respond. On the quarter hour mark, a cross from promising new signing Dale Edwards found the head of Wills, who managed to guide the ball over the Hinckley defence and into the goal.
Things almost got even better for Bromsgrove when Edwards finished off a scything run with a powerful drive from range, but Hinckley stopper Sam Arnold was equal to it, palming the ball wide.
Unfortunately for Sporting, things went rapidly downhill from there as Fitter received a contentious red card for a challenge on Javia Roberts on the 19th minute.
The resultant free kick was then dispatched with aplomb by Nathan Walker. His pin-point effort from just outside the area flew into the top corner, leaving Sporting stopper Brendon Bunn with no chance.
Two minutes later, Hinckley’s lead was doubled. The away side flooded the box and a beleaguered Bromsgrove just couldn’t deal with the pressure. It could have been any one of four players who scored but in the end, it was Kalenda who inflicted further misery onto Sporting.
Bromsgrove almost made their way back into the game on the 39th minute, when Luke Dugmore’s fierce shot was tipped onto the crossbar by Arnold.
Instead, it was to be Hinckley who scored just before the half time whistle. Adaggio found himself with the freedom of Worcestershire as he roamed through the defence before beating Bunn.
The second half failed to bring about any change in fortunes for Bromsgrove as Richards added a second to his tally ten minutes in.
McKenzie netted on the 80th minute, but Hinckley extended their lead back to four goals in the fourth minute of added time. Adaggio clinched his second with a simple tap-in into an empty net after the ball rebounded off the post.
