Monmouth's Kingfishers jumped to third place in the Gwent County League with a comfortable 2 - 0 win over a spirited Abercarn United at the Sportsground last Saturday. Playing for the first time in three weeks, after an enforced lay off, Andrew Smith's young guns took a while to get their game going, constantly failing to spring Abercarn's high defensive line. Early chances went begging as Ford and Rogers could only sting the goalkeeper's hands while Bowen, game as usual, made a nuisance of himself on his return form injury. Good interplay from Hughes and Smith on the half hour, finally unlocked the Abercarn defence for Ford to play in Bowen, who rolled the ball into the empty net. From then it was relatively plain sailing, with Rogers adding the second on the hour after superb work down the right from Bowen. Player Manager Smith was happy with the result commenting "I said before the game that it's now a matter of chalking off the victories and making sure we do the simple things well. "We did exactly that today and although this was no thriller it was competent and confident". Kingfisher's chairman, Lee Robson, was also not getting carried away with title talk but he did concede that the prize of Welsh League football was a distinct possibility. "Newport Civil Service have been leaders all season and don't look like slipping up" he said. "The thing is we said exactly the same last season and we managed to put together a great run and pip them for the division two title. Today was our fifth consecutive win in the league and if we keep it going we'll certainly have Newport looking over their shoulders. In fact they had some of their players and official at the game on Saturday". This Saturday the Kingfishers are away to Mardy (ko 2.15) but the reserve team are in Cup quarter final action against local rivals Tintern. Reserve team manager Jamie Morgan was looking forward to the clash. "We won't have played for six weeks but Saturday promises to be a great occasion for both sides" he said. "We have certainly developed a close rivalry over the past two seasons and we owe them one for our cup final defeat last season". The game is at the Sportsground (kick off 2pm).
