A beautiful night for football, mild and dry, with no wind to spoil things and both teams responded to the perfect conditions by providing an entertaining game for the boisterous crowd.

The match took it's time to warm up however, not helped by what seemed to be a serious injury to Hereford centre-half Ian Wright. After a melee in the home penalty area he appeared to collide with a Yeovil defender and lay prone on the grass for a considerable time before being stretchered off. Hopefully not as serious a problem as it appeared for a time, I was informed by a steward that an ambulance was called but that Wright was sitting up and talking by the time it arrived.

The incident dampened passions on the pitch for a while, if not in the crowd, and neither side really threatened on goal although Hereford had marginally the better of it in the midfield battle. Then, in the 26th minute, Yeovil put together their first decent movement of the match which resulted in the only goal of the game. After some neat interpassing in midfield a left-sided cross fell into the path of the onrushing David PIPER whose powerful shot left goalkeeper Jones with no chance.

Minutes later Jason Eaton was pulled down by Wall in the Hereford defence when bursting through on goal. The crowd screamed for a red card but the referee contented himself with the yellow, a fair enough decision in the circumstances. Ben Smith managed to get himself booked shortly afterwards for kicking the ball away after a free-kick had been awarded to the visitors and Hereford's best chance of the game swiftly followed. Ian Rodgerson found himself one on one with Tony Pennock after some excellent work from Taylor in the midfield, but Pennock spread himself to deny the Hereford veteran, an excellent response from the Welsh keeper to the taunts of the Hereford fans behind the goal.

The second half saw less goalmouth action than the first period, but was completely absorbing from the spectators viewpoint. Neither side could claim to gain anything like a measure of control in midfield but despite that genuine chances were few and far between.

Not that this was detracting from the quality of the game. The home crowd became frustrated by what they saw as the referee's refusal to punish Hereford defender Wall's persistent infringements, and their mood wasn't sweetened when the blonde number 6 became involved in a spot of handbags with Jason Eaton after a foul on the Yeovil forward for which Hereford's Sturgess was booked. David Norton - evidently relishing playing against his old club - put the resultant free-kick over the bar. Sturgess repaid the compliment by shooting over from a free-kick at the other end, and Patmore forced a brilliant save from Jones in the visitors goal after some excellent work wide on the right from the outstanding David Piper. Hereford began to create some half-chances of their own but were let down by some poor finishing from Pierce in particular, Pennock rarely being forced into making a save.