After their poor performance at Hitchin only days earlier, Billericay Town followers were understandably apprehensive about a trip to The Rec to face highly fancied Aldershot with a two wins-out of two games record.

But a marvellous display carefully nurtured with a clever use of substitutes saw Town back on the winning trail.

Manager Gary Calder fielded new signing Alan Brett up front with Stafford Brown. With Sammy Cooper back on the wings on paper Town certainly had what it took in attack.

The defence too was completely changed from the midweek game with both full backs replaced, and midfield saw the welcome return of Dean Parratt from injury.

A sunny day and a 2,000 plus crowd settled down to what the vast majority expected to be a comfortable home win.

And while it is the Hampshire club's lot to find all their opponents treating the Aldershot game as something akin to a Cup Final, Town fans hardly dared hope for anything more than a goalless draw.

And while the final result showed just how hard Town's management had worked over the last few days, it took nearly 20 minutes for the visitors to settle.

In that period Aldershot created several chances and ought to have gone ahead.

On seven minutes ex-Town player Leon Gutzmore and former Town loanee Joe Narty combined well to win the game's first corner for the hosts.

In the tenth minute, Jimmy Sugrue put a low cross well wide to the left of Gavin King's goal; and on 14 minutes Gutzmore put a bouncing ball, which beat the defence, into the side netting.

Having survived all the pressure, Billericay began to get more faith in themselves and had quite a promising spell around the 20 minutes mark.

This only served to spur on the hosts and Town's defensive strategies came under the spotlight again as Aldershot sought to find ways through.

Steve Terry's captaincy capabilities were put to the test and the pressure was such that three Town players' names went into Mr Crossley's book, all for fouls of a blocking nature as the speed of Gutzmore and Narty threatened to tell.

Town took 30 minutes to win their first corner and 45 minutes to offer a meaningful threat to Aldershot goalkeeper Mark Russell.

On the stroke of half- time, Brett found himself behind two defenders and facing goal.

The bounce of the ball defeated him though, but gave a glimmer of hope that things might not be as clear cut as they might have first appeared.

The half time whistle went immediately and the first attack after the restart saw Town go ahead.

Cooper tormented two defenders down the left and left them beaten. He crossed over Russell and his back line and the ball was met perfectly by Browne whose downwards header beat Russell.

Town fans, penned in a corner up the opposite end to the action could not even guess what had happened as the effort stunned the Aldershot folk who had barely retaken their places.

The net rippled as the ball hit it and 150 or so Town fans went wild with excitement as the balance of the crowd tried to take in what had happened.

The gloom of Hitchin could hardly have been lifted in a more spectacular manner, but Billericay then had the prospect of 44 minutes in which to hang on

Remarkably though, while Aldershot then went on the attack, Billericay met fire with fire and nearly scored with a repeat effort 12 minutes later.

Cooper had gone off clutching his thigh when the goal was scored.

Replacement Keiren Adams sparked up the midfield and defending a one goal lead, this is what was wanted.

Aldershot could never relax as Adams and Lee Williams, taking up Cooper's place, and who became more influential as the game progressed, initiated many forward moves to keep the pressure on the hosts.

On 66 minutes King and central defender Kenny Roudette clashed while trying to get a ball on the edge of the area.

The ball fell to an Aldershot forward whose lob just shaded the top of the Town net. Calder then brought on David Adekola for Brett.

The former Nigerian international is good at holding onto the ball and this frustrated Aldershot as he could both hold and threaten, meaning they had to retain a fully manned back line despite being one down.

Home manager George Borg also used his substitutes as the experienced management teams tried to out manoeuvre one another

Town's efforts almost counted for nothing on 74 minutes, and their fans could hardly bare to watch as a fierce shot was first caught by King and was then spilled and carried on slowly goalwards.

As an advancing Aldershot forward lunged out, King recovered to stop the ball only inches from the line.

For Billericay, everyone played their part, including Billy Goldstone brought on in the last minute to prevent the last Aldershot efforts as town sought to close everything down in the dying moments.

And they were completely successful to record a most notable win and to take three points back to New Lodge.

Billericay Town: King, Game, Williams, Roudette, Terry, Parratt (Goldstone), Penn, Linger, Brett (Adekola), Browne, Cooper (Adams).

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.