Newport YMCA League Prog's edition

I’d like to welcome the officials, players and supporters of Newport YMCA to the Marston’s Stadium for tonight’s MacWhirter Welsh League Division One match.

I'd like to welcome tonight’s match officials, they are Mark Evans, Hugh Towns and Phil Owen, enjoy the game and we’ll see you in the club afterwards.

Our opponents had a fantastic result last Saturday in beating Welshpool and reaching the Welsh Cup semi final where they will play Bangor City. They are on a fantastic journey and we wish them all the best against Bangor as they carry the flag for the Welsh League. Mike Coldrick can feel very proud what the club has achieved and hopefully they can go one step further to realise their dream.

A week last Saturday we gained a good 2-1 win at home against Caldicot with Ian Jones and Kieran Howells getting the goals. We looked comfortable throughout and even had the luxury of missing a first half penalty.

Last Saturday we travelled to Dinas Powys and came away with a fantastic 1-0 win that keeps us right up there with the leading pack. We rode our luck at times with our opponents having a penalty saved by Leon Cosker; they also hit the woodwork and missed a sitter in the second half. On saying that I thought our players put in a strong determined performance against a very good side.  Dan Williams put in a polished performance in defence with Kieran Howells putting in another solid display and he was rewarded with the winning goal in the 95th minute.  Both Steve Cox and Ian Jones led the line well against strong experienced defenders. The win takes us to sixth position within touching distance of the top two teams. At the moment the players are giving everything for the club with us picking up 19 points from the last 7 matches. Confidence should be high and if we can get another win tonight it will elevate us up to third place.

Karl Lewis and Shaun Best return to the squad tonight after both being unavailable on Saturday whilst Daniel McGrath’s hamstring injury which he sustained in training will unfortunately keep him out for another three weeks.  Last Saturday saw us take six youth team players to Dinas Powys and they seem to be responding superbly with none of them looking as if they are overawed at all with us rising the table.