Wakehurst pass Queen’s exam with flying colours!

The Ballymena men remain in a healthy mid-table position in Belfast Telegraph Championship Two after a 4-3 win over Queen’s University on Saturday gave them a second straight victory, but Gregg believes his side can still achieve one of his pre-season targets, of finishing in the top six in what is a highly competitive division.

Wakehurst are currently three points off sixth spot but they have games in hand over some of the teams immediately above them.

“We’ve had occasions before this season where we’ve maybe had a couple of good results followed by a lapse again,” Gregg told Times Sport.

“What I’m challenging the players to do is put together a run between now and the end of the season to see how high we can go.

“We were 4-1 up with eight minutes to go on Saturday but we got a bit ragged and it ended up being a more nervy finish than it should have been.

“On the plus side, our first half display was a delight - I would say it was as good as anything we’ve produced this season.

“The frustrating thing is that we won’t get the chance to carry on the momentum this weekend,” he added.

“We were supposed to be playing Lurgan Celtic but they have players away with the junior international team and they have been granted a postponement,” added Gregg.

Queen’s have been on a tremendous run of late but they couldn’t have expected an opening 17 minutes like they experienced against an eager Wakehurst side.

David Gage’s strong header within the first minute cleared the visitors defence and Conor Gregg raced clear as keeper Gerrard Duff come off his line, Gregg casually lifted the ball over him to nestle in the net.

Queens responded and were denied by Lee McCaughern, clearing Donnelly’s headed attempt off the goal-line.

Wakehurst went two up on 13 minutes after a delightful move involving Conor Gregg, Aaron Lemon and Jason Paul, with Paul tucking Lemon’s driven cross under Duff.

Four minutes later it was 3-0. Andy Laughlin’s headed pass found Ryan Gregg and he picked out McCaughern running in at the back post to slot the ball past Duff.

Many teams would have fallen apart at this stage but Queens are made of sterner stuff and it took two superb stops from Marc Maybin to keep out Donnelly and Culbert, before the interval.

Queens were quickly out of the blocks in the second half as they turned the screw on the home defence with wave after wave of attack, but when they did manage to break through the back four, they found Maybin in excellent form.

But he could do nothing about Donnelly’s strike on 65 minutes, which took a wicked deflection to reduce the deficit.

This constant onslaught from the visitors continued as both managers used all their substitutions in the final 25 minutes, but a long clearance from Laughlin six minutes from time was chased down by Paul and as he raced into the area he was brought down by a combination of Harper and Duff.

Conor Gregg coolly converted the resultant penalty and the game looked settled, but two late strikes from Paul Prenter and substitute Johnny Maybin Made it a nail-biting finish for Wakehurst.

Wakehurst: M Maybin, P Alexander, D Stevenson, M Crawford, R Gregg, L McCaughern, A Laughlin, A Lemon, J Paul, C Gregg. Subs: S Mellon, J Lemon, S McKinney, S Fletcher, D Parker.