James Norwood headed home an 80th minute winner
as ten man Tranmere Rovers saw off Boreham Wood in the Vanarama National League
Play-off final at Wembley and make a return to the SkyBet Football League after
a three year absence.
The Birkenhead club finished runners up to champions
Macclesfield Town in the National League and then saw off Ebbsfleet United in
their semi final play off at Prenton Park 4-2 after extra time, this after
coming from behind twice before eventually seeing the Kent side off with two
goals in the extra half hour.
Wood themselves finished in fourth spot in the National
League and saw off AFC Fylde in an eliminator match at Meadow Park and then
travelled to take on Sutton United at Gander Green Lane in the semi final and edged
out the hosts 3-2 to take their place in the final here.
And the matches between the two sides in the league campaign
saw a draw at Prenton Park before Wood managed to beat Rovers in the return
match at Meadow Park, however both games were tight so this final was a hard
one to call.
Tranmere of course were in this very match a year ago when
they played Forest Green Rovers at Wembley for a chance to get back into the
Football League, however they were stunned by the Stroud side that day, so they
sure didn’t want history to repeat itself.
And backed by over 10,000 fans from Birkenhead they
certainly had the support advantage over Wood who were well outnumbered in those
stakes in a crowd off 16,306 at the national stadium.
However after just 48 seconds of this contest Rovers were
right on the back foot as a loose ball saw Liam Ridehalgh and Wood’s Ricky
Shakes go into a challenge and see the Rovers man go over the top of the ball
and produce a rash challenge, and referee Neil Hair had no hesitation in
sending the Tranmere man off, and they had to play pretty much the entire game
with a man less.
It was an astonishing start to proceedings however this just
spurred the men in white on and in the sixth minute went in front when Norwood
crossed from the left and saw Andy Cook get across his man to power a header into
the near corner, and see Rovers players celebrate in front of some rather irate
fans in the Wood section, who unfortunately threw several plastic bottles full
of liquid in their direction, with one hitting the head of a Rovers player, all
rather unsavoury and not what you want to see in football.
So the ten men had the lead, and to be honest didn’t really
look like they were a man down, and it looked like they would go in with a half
time lead, until Wood struck in the eighth minute of first half stoppage time,
as after they had got down the left and terrific ball squared across the box
found Bruno Andrade who side footed home the equaliser at a crucial time for Wood.
Half Time Boreham Wood 1 Tranmere Rovers 1
It really looked as though the odds were stacked against Rovers,
not only did they have ten men they had also used all three off their substitutions
up in the first half, so there were no fresh legs for them to throw on and you
felt as the game went on Wood would surely see their man advantage count
against tiring Rovers bodies.
But just like the first forty five minutes it was hard to
tell who had the ten men as Tranmere battled gamely and kept the Wood attack at
bay in the most part, and also had openings themselves as they looked for a
potential winner.
And as the game went on you had this feeling that the ten men
may pinch a winner, and sure enough with ten minutes of the contest remaining
Connor Jennings, who had come on for Rovers as a first half substitute just ten
days after being discharged from hospital following an illness, sent in a cross
onto Norwood’s head and he guided his effort towards the corner and despite
keeper Smith getting a hand to it, the ball still found the corner of the net
and cued wild scenes behind that goal filled with Rovers fans.
Wood could not find a response to that and Tranmere Rovers
took the win in what was an incredible effort from Micky Mellon’s men who
finally return to the football league.
Despair for Wood though who had never been out of the non league pyramid
in their 70 year history, however the result marked the end of a remarkable
campaign for them, a highest ever league finish and best FA Cup run under the
stewardship of boss Luke Garrard.
Full Time Boreham Wood 1 Tranmere Rovers 2
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