Northern Rangers 3 (C.Hunt, P.Lanu-Atckinson, S.Jago) Def Ulverstone 1 (B.Foote) 2-0 H/T

Thanks to Brendon Mulder for the pictures.

Video Highlights of match here

Northern Rangers travelled to Valley road for a match against Ulverstone, which was a top of the table clash with Ulverstone rolling nicely with 3 wins from 3 starts, and Northern Rangers starting to return to some form after a sluggish couple of games.

Rangers win against Prospect Knights last week made it hard for Whitemore to justify any changes to the squad and went in with an identical line up.

A pacey start to the match saw Rangers open up the score board first when Chris Hunt pounced on a parry from the Ulverstone keeper and slammed the ball home for his third goal in two matches for the club.

Rangers were enjoying the lion’s share of possession in the first half and made it count when Patty Lanau-Atkinson scored from a well taken shot that hit the cross bar and went in off the back of the Ulverstone keeper to double the lead and put Rangers 2-0 in front.

The score line was taken into half time and Rangers were looking to kill the game off early in the second half, but Ulverstone came out determined to make a fist of the game.

They got back into the game when Ben Foote struck a fine shot just inside the area and past Pooley in goals to make it 2-1 following a turnover on the left wing.

This lifted the coastal side and they began to create more and more scoring chances, but they needed more luck as the Ranger back line repelled the attacks.

Ambrose was introduced mid-way through the half and looked threatening, almost scoring and setting two strong chances up from the right hand side.

Stefan Jago chipped in to secure the lead late in the match with a finely taken one on one chance which made it 3-1.

The win extends Rangers winning streak against Ulverstone to 6 games now, not having stumbled against them since the last round of 2008, it was also the clubs 19^th premier league win against Ulverstone since the clubs inception in 1999.

Whitemore’s comments "I thought we deserved the win but were a little way off our best. Conditioning looked to central to this. Trying to get, and keep us fit using only the ball is the ideal but we needed to go up a gear against a physically competitive side and a few players didn't look as though we had another gear to find. With both senior and reserve games the midfield areas got very open, and we weren't able to get the pressure on the ball we needed. We looked leggy in the second half of both games and there were a number of uncharacteristic skill errors, and concentration lapses.

Square of Death!

Ulverstone, to their credit, are a much stronger side than last season with plenty of emerging talent. They could be a real threat. They were organised, passed the ball well and were physically able to match us. Had they had more of a threat up front it would have been a very tight game.

We played out from the back really well, and were always composed which was pleasing. We fell down by going forward too quickly, which stretched the midfield and overworked/isolated the forwards. More patience with the ball would have given us time to get support forward and move up as a unit. We didn't dominate possession as much as we have done in other games. Credit to Ulverstone here too.

We looked really threatening up front but must be more ruthless. We had very good chances to have scored 5 or 6 (would have been very harsh on Ulvie) and as we have already seen this season missed chances cost points. Our movement wasn't as good as last week, but again was partly down to the distance between forwards and midfield.

Funky (Mark Ambrose) was superb coming off the bench and give us real explosiveness. Interesting selection dilemma next match.

Defensively we again looked very very solid and restricted them to a couple of good chances. Issa I thought was outstanding, and showed how to put pressure on the ball. Declan Cuschieri is growing by the game.

In the end we played ok, a bit patchy but still beat the top side - a side who may well finish top 4 and will certainly take points off other challengers.  We were all a little subdued after the game, which is a good sign. We have got really high expectations of ourselves and know we can do much better."

The Reserves has a near faultless first half carrying a scoreline of 3-0 into the sheds and looking to more than double that advantage, but dropped their bundle in the second and allowed Ulverstone to get back into the match.

Ulverstone scored the first goal of the second half before Rangers restored the lead, only to have Ulverstone reply through a penalty, late goals to Ari Gajewski and a lobbed effort from Brendon Mulder settled the result at 6-2.

Adam Whitemore said after the game "I thought the reserves were excellent, first half especially. When a side comes off having won 6-2 and are disappointed that's a indicator of a team with standards. We totally dominated the first half, scored 3 but should have had 6. The signs were there though that defensively we were a bit loose which is understandable given we had a makeshift backline.

Second half our midfield ran out of legs and we weren't compact enough. Good with the ball, but struggled without. Not enough pressure on the ball."