Blyth Spartans put three past Bishop's Stortford as the visitors see red

Spartans took the game to their visitors from the start and could have finished with more than the three goals, assistant manager Jon Shaw scored one but missed a couple of good chances, Jordan Hickey saw a chance land on the roof of the net and an effort by sub Charlie Aitken was pushed out for a corner.

Bishop’s Stortford created chances of their own, Alex Mitchell saving from Aaron Greene when the game was still goalless, but once they went ahead Spartans never looked like losing.

Captain Nicky Deverdics scored the first goal with a free kick after 20 minutes before Shaw had his first chance of the afternoon when he tried to chip the keeper, who managed to get back in time to scoop the ball away, however, he couldn’t miss when an unselfish pass by Cedric Main left him with the ball in front of an empty net.

Shaw was in the thick of the action and struck the bar early in the second half before failing to find the target with a header after good work by JJ O’Donnell.

The visitors’ task got harder when Anyne Godfrinne was shown a straight red card for an off-the-ball incident with Finn Cousin-Dawson.

Shortly afterwards Main, who had returned to the side after injury, got Spartans’ third goal.

The visitors ended the game with nine men after Tobias Braney was shown a red card in added time for pushing his arm into the face of Cousin-Dawson.

Speaking after the game, Harrison Clark said: “I thought we started the game really well, right on the front foot from the get go, and that just set us up for a good game. We came in at half time 2-0 up and the main message to the boys was just stay on top.”

Assistant manager and goalscorer Jon Shaw added: “They never really troubled us and from there we obviously attacked with good quality, we tried to find spaces, we tried to probe and play through them and do all the things we talk about.”