Match Report
St Ives Town V Stamford
Pitching-In Southern League Premier Central 11-08-2025
Ives boss Ricky Marheineke will have been looking for a reaction from his players following the hugely disappointing loss against Barwell last weekend, and he certainly got it as a first half goal from Theo Alexandrou proved to be the winner in Ives first home league game of the season.
The result sees Ives claim their first three points of the season and moves them into 11th place ahead of the Tuesday night fixtures. Stamford, who are still yet to open their goal scoring account for the season, find themselves in 14th.place.
With there being just over 48 hours between the last two fixtures both sides made changes to their starting XI’s which featured on the opening weekend of the season. For the Ives, Ethan Creary was brought into the side and given the responsibility of leading the team for the first time, whilst Gibou Njie and Amir Hadi were also favoured ahead of Liam Cross and Neo Dobson who picked up knocks against Barwell.
The visitors, who’s first line-up of the season against Alvechurch featured six debutants, made three changes to their side, with Tobias Liversidge, George Hobbins and Luke Johnson replacing Harry Vince, Ryan Wilson and Jason Law.
It was Stamford manager Graham Drury’s side who looked the most threatening in the early knockings of the game as five minutes in Johnson delivered a good-looking cross into the Ives penalty area, only to be headed clear by summer recruit Duncan Idehen, a phase of play that would become somewhat of a theme throughout.
In his pre-match programme notes Marheineke spoke about the physical challenge Stamford would pose to his team and the importance of his players being up for the battle and with some of the early defending on show from Idehen and Jordan Williams making their areal presence felt, it was no doubt a message received loud and clear by his team.
Once the home side had settled into their defensive work for the evening it was their turn to cause some problems for the Stamford backline as a lapse in concentration in the 12th minute saw Kobe Chong race towards goal, only to be denied by the onrushing Thomas Jackson, who got to the ball just in time to clear it to safety.
Ives were starting to get a hold of proceedings at this stage and it wasn’t long before they nearly created another good opening. Njie showed great tenacity to win the ball in midfield and find Theo Alexandrou, whose pass was inches away from finding the feet of Amir Hadi, with the forward bearing down on goal.
The first shot on target came 25 minutes in as Hadi showed great strength to hold off his man on the edge of the area but his effort lost some power through the air and was caught by Jackson down low at his near post.
By this point the pressure on Stamford’s goal was building and, in the 36th minute, Ives made what turned out to be the all-important breakthrough as a flowing move saw Jernade Meade play the ball out wide to full-back Jiah Medrano, who produced a superb left-footed cross that was met by the head of Alexandrou at the back post to give the hosts a 1-0 lead.
Despite the overwhelmingly positive feeling around the ground as the Ives looked to take a lead into the break, the home fans had their hearts in their mouths in the 5th minute of stoppage time as Liversidge went down in the box under the challenge of an Ives defender, only for referee Jonathan Lam to point away from the spot and show the Stamford number 11 a yellow card for simulation.
The second half continued in the same vein, with Ives continuing to deal with the areal threat posed by Stamford, which also included having to deal with the impressive long throw Rhys Sharpe had at his disposal.
However, as time wore on, there was a feeling that one goal may not be enough to secure all three points for Marheineke’s side as the visitors began to push hard for an equaliser. In the 56th minute, Ollie Taylor was forced into action as substitue Jaoa Varela linked up with Liversidge and produced a good effort, but the Ives goalkeeper was equal to it, beating his strike away for a corner.
The home side responded well to this period of Stamford pressure and started to exploit some of the space left behind on the counter as in the 68th minute, Chong danced past a couple of defenders on the edge of the penalty area before unleashing a strike just wide of Jackson’s left-hand post.
Ives made a double change in the 69th as Chong and Njie made way for Dobson and Albie O’Keefe, with Marheineke looking to add some much needed energy to his midfield and forward options.
Then, in the 84th minute, the visitors had arguably their best chance of the game as a dangerous cross into the penalty area from substitute Connor Bartle found the head of Fletcher Toll who kept his header down but couldn’t quite manage to direct his effort on target from close-range as it sailed out of play for a goal kick.
The news that there would be a minimum of seven added minutes at the end of the second half was greeted with the kind of noises you would expect from fans of a side within touching distance of their first win of the season. In the 92nd minute however, there was a great moment for summer signing Jamal Adams, who made his Ives league debut, replacing the hard-working Hadi.
The 25 year-old forward almost managed to cap his first league appearance in sublime fashion on two separate occasions. In the 94th minute, Adams was played through by Dobson but denied by Jackson from close-range, and he went close to pulling off the spectacular in the final minute of injury time as he took aim 30 yards from goal, only for his effort to be denied by the fingertips of the Stamford keeper, who managed to deflect the ball onto the crossbar.
After what felt like an age, the referee brought the game to a close with Status Quo providing the backing vocals to jubilant scenes around the Quattro-Tech Westwood Road as Ives claimed all three points. They will be looking to build on this result and performance as they prepare to host Stourbridge on Saturday.
Final Score: St Ives Town 1 Stamford 0 Half Time 1 – 0
Goals:
ST IVES: Alexandrou 36,
STAMFORD: none
Team Line Ups:
ST IVES: Taylor, Creary (capt), Medrano, Williams, Idehen, Chong (Dobson 69), Miles, Meade, Njie (O’Keefe 69), Hadi (Adams 92), Alexandrou, Unused subs: Gyamfi, Shepherd
STAMFORD: Jackson, Marzano, Sharpe, Thomas (capt), Cooke, Rowley, Sanchez-Tonge (Bartle 65), Hobbins, Toll, Johnson (Varela 30-Replaced by Vince 56), Liversidge (Freeman 69), Unused subs: Wilson
Referee: Jonathan Lam
Cards: Yellow: ST IVES: Medrano (58), STAMFORD: Liversidge (50), Cooke (89)
IVES SUPPORTERS MAN OF THE MATCH: Duncan Idehen
Attendance: 352