Wrexham Evening Leader

Now for the hat-trick

01 December 2004

by Richard Williams

Denis SmithDENIS SMITH is two thirds of the way to completing a perfect week.

In what the Reds' boss billed as an important seven days on the pitch, he saw his Wrexham side beat rivals Chester City 1-0 at the Saunders Honda Stadium last night to reach the LDV Vans Trophy Northern Section semi-finals.

Spanish striker Juan Ugarte, who signed a contract on Monday to stay at the Racecourse until the end of the season, scored his first goal in a Wrexham shirt putting the Reds in the last four of the Northern Section with Tranmere Rovers, Oldham and Hereford United. The draw will be made on Sky Sports on Saturday morning.

Last night's victory was on the back of an important three points picked up at Huddersfield Town on Saturday and Smith now takes Wrexham to Scunthorpe in the second round of the FA Cup on Friday.

That match, which is live on Sky, is on the same day that a court decision could be made to put the club into administration.

On the pitch, Smith is delighted with the way things are going and said: "It's an important week. I said to the lads we've got three games we need to win and we've won two of them so hopefully we can get the hat-trick on Friday.

"It's been all about winning this week. We needed the three points Saturday, obviously the local derby and now we've got a big one to finish it off on Friday evening.

"If we can get a win on Friday that will be a massive boost, to go into the hat for that third round and then you're hoping for a big one to pay the debts of.

"But let's enjoy tonight and that's what we want to do. It's a local derby, it was a difficult game and we have come and got the result we wanted."

Wrexham bossed the first half as Chester struggled to get into the match and Ugarte struck following a flowing move involving Simon Spender, Scott Green and Chris Llewellyn.

Both sides created chances after the break and despite City threatening an equaliser, Smith was happy with the way his side performed and said the result was all that mattered.

Smith said: "I thought in the first half we were fairly comfortable. Juan's got great movement and it's a great goal, good finish.

"Second half they've had to come at us and fair play to them they've put us under pressure, thrown people forward.

"But I always thought we could possibly nick a second, that's what I was waiting for, I thought sooner or later we were going to get one. We didn't but in the end these sort of games are about winning, it's as simple as that.

"There's been chances both ends second half. First half wasn't really like a local derby, second half was more like you would expect."

Blues boss Ian Rush reckoned his side deserved to win.

He said: "I thought our lads were a different class in the second half and I thought we deserved to win.

"Wrexham had one shot in the first half and scored a goal. I thought it was an even first half, but we were a much better side in the second half and I couldn't ask for anything else from my players.

Wrexham were missing seven first team regulars through injury and Smith was particularly happy with die way the younger players who have come into the Reds' defence performed against Chester.

But again Smith stressed it was an all-round, hard working team performance: "When you think how young they are, you've got Spender and Morgan - the kids - and Pejic's not much older. It's very pleasing to get a defensive performance like that.

"But to get a defensive performance like that you have to defend from the front, you have to work hard. And the lads have worked hard, that's two games where they've put it in and they've got their reward."

While talk of administration cannot be ignored, Smith is naturally disappointed that it had come to this.

"Hopefully I can concentrate on what's happening on the pitch but I have been obviously involved in things which are going off it," added Smith. "I think we are getting to a stage where we look as though we will be going into administration and we have got to live with that.

"It's not fair on the players and it's not fair on the fans because they have not done anything wrong. But, those are the rules, we have got to accept them and we will take it as a challenge."