SAM Saunders' fifth goal of the season just saw Brentford scrape past brave Basingstoke and earn a place in the draw for the FA Cup second round this afternoon.
The opening exchanges were fairly even, but it took Brentford just nine minutes to get off the mark when Saunders was brought down on the edge of the area, sized up former Bees keeper Ashley Bayes, then gave him no chance with a stunning free-kick.
Gary Alexander then played a superb one-two with Mike Grella on the right side of the area, but the return was just blocked with Alexander already planning his celebration, while a similar move on the left between Saunders and Blair Adams saw the latter fire just over.
Soon after, Grella just failed to reach a superb cross from Adams following good play by Alexander and Saunders, who then put in Toumani Diagouraga with a nice reverse pass, but Stuart Lake got back to block.
Saunders was on fire at this point, and next just failed to back-flick in a cross from Niall McGinn, while Delano Sam-Yorke's shot was deflected into the side netting for Basingstoke's first real chance, Tim Sills testing Richard Lee soon after.
In first half injury time, Kevin O'Connor went down with a nasty-looking injury on the edge of the area and was stretchered off.
After the break, Marcel Eger put a bullet header from a Saunders corner just over, before Saunders slid in onto an Alexander flick-on but was beaten to it by Bayes, while at the other end, Shaleum Logan made a great recovery tackle as Sean MacAuley bore down on goal.
Bayes was equal to a shot from Grella soon after, while Matt Warner fired wide for the visitors, who went close to equalising on 70 minutes when sub Leon Legge hacked off the line from David Pratt.
Lee then saved well from the same player as Basingstoke broke in numbers, with Tim Sills heading wide from the resulting corner, before just being beaten by Eger to a teasing cross.
BEES: Lee, Logan, Eger, Llera (Legge 63), Adams, Saunders, Diagouraga, O'Connor (Bean 46), McGinn, Alexander, Grella (Donaldson 77). SUBS NOT USED: Devlin, Woodman, Weston, Oyeleke.
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