FA Cup fourth qualifying round replay
Barnet 4-1 Chelmsford City
Boss Martin Allen praised man of the match David Stephens as Barnet beat Chelmsford 4-1 in the FA Cup fourth round qualifying replay on Tuesday night.
The Bees booked themselves a first round tie at home to Wycombe Wanderers on Saturday week following the victory over the Conference South side.
And Allen was quick to single out Stephens who scored the second goal at the Hive from close range.
“David has practiced and worked outside the hours given to score and attack the ball and I was absolutely thrilled that he got that goal,” Allen said of the centre-back.
The Bees effectively had the tie won in the first half an hour as they scored three times.
John Akinde opened the scoring after capitalising on a poor headed back pass from Chelmsford captain Mark Hughes’ to take the lead in the sixth minute.
Stephens doubled the home side’s lead on 11 minutes, prodding in from two yards after the visitors failed to clear a corner.
And on the half hour, the diminutive Luke Gambin got beyond the left-back and cut the ball back to his captain Curtis Weston who lashed in to make it 3-0.
Chelmsford’s Joe Ward made it 3-1 with a composed finish after substitute defender Jack Saville misjudged the bounce of the ball early on in the second-half.
But Barnet finished the game off when Luisma Villa’s deflected effort looped over Tony Thompson in the Chelmsford goal to make it 4-1 on 78 minutes.
Allen added: “They had one shot in the second half and scored one goal. Although they had a lot of the ball they didn’t really threaten our goal too much."
Barnet will play host to Wycombe in the next round and Allen highlighted how far the League Two high-fliers have come since last season.
He added: “It’s going to be a big crowd. Wycombe is only half an hour away from here.
Gareth Ainsworth has done a fantastic job with the team struggling last year. I guess for this one you could say that we are the underdogs.”
