Braintree and Brackley will have to do it all again in Trophy after draw

Iron's Roman Michael-Percil on the ball on Saturday for Braintree in the FA Trophy clash with Brackley. Photo; JON WEAVER (Image: Archant)

The Iron have is all to do again on Tuesday night at St James Park after this goalless draw in a game of so few clear-cut scoring chances from either side making it obvious to any neutral observers in the 249 crowd that for long periods it was always going to end in stalemate, writes David Ward.

Iron boss Brad Quinton brought in fit again full-back Jon Muleba after his injury lay-off and put him into midfield alongside Billy Crook after midfielder Luke Allen failing a late fitness test.

The Iron certainly had the better of the first-half chances with efforts from Phil Roberts (14 minutes) and Roman Michael-Percil (39) both ending up in the side netting while at the other end the visitors rarely looked threatening with their best coming from an Aaron Williams’ sharp shot also tucking into the Iron side netting on 20 minutes.

The second half saw the visitors have more of the game as the Iron lost their way a little with some dreadful, stray passing and at times they struggled to clear their lines under pressure while for the visitors and both Gareth Dean (70) and Matt Lowe (81) came closest to scoring when well positioned.

Iron boss Brad Quinton felt it was a fair result adding: “It was a case of two good teams cancelling each other out – we did well in the first half but players failed to stick to the game plan in the second half which was frustrating.”

He went on: “We didn’t really pepper their goal with shots as we should have done and I thought we created enough in the first half to have come in at the interval in the lead.

“But we have it all to do on Tuesday when I will freshen up the side with some changes and we will be more determined to win,” he continued.

“We’re still in the cup and we’ve kept a clean sheet too and that will also give is confidence - we will certainly be looking for a vastly improve away performance there than we put up when losing there in the FA Cup earlier in the season.”

Brackley boss Kevin Wilkins declared: “I felt we always looked the more likely side to score but it’s a difficult place to come to and they made it hard for us.”