HOW IT HAPPENED
The game itself had a fiery start to it, as was to be expected, with the added value of a London Derby attached to it.
The first real chance fell to the Bees as Wesley Fonguck produced a better corner than his first, with the ball landing at Hooper’s feet, whose powerful effort was just about parried away by Elliot Justham.
The Bees continued to threaten the Daggers goal with Alex McQueen given a chance to score against his old club, but his free-kick found itself on the wrong side of the post.
The Daggers began to grow into the game with 20 minutes on the clock, having a larger proportion of the possession and beginning to threaten Scott Loach’s goal.
Although both sides were having chances, in reality, they were mainly half-chances and weren’t of any real threat.
However, just before the thirty-minute mark, the Daggers opened the scoring when Angelo Balanta headed in from a well timed cross.
The Bees could have found themselves straight back in the game, three minutes later, when Hooper did well to play in Fonguck, but his shot was too tame to pose any danger to Justham’s goal.
McQueen in an almost identical position to his first free-kick played in a threatening cross which led to a corner. Fonguck received the ball from a short corner but hit his shot wide of the mark.
The start of the second half mirrored that of the first with an intense showing from both sets of players, but no real pattern to the play.
The next goal would be vital and you could tell the players could sense that, with neither side really committing numbers in attack.
With an hour of the game played, the hosts were reduced to ten men, after Luke Croll received a second yellow card for dissent.
It took just over twenty minutes for the first real chance of the half, as the Bees broke through, with Eliot Richards trying his luck from outside the area, which was held firmly by Justham as Hooper was closing in.
The Daggers, who had been relatively quiet since the restart nearly doubled their lead with 15 minutes to go. Mitch Brundle launched a free-kick which caused all sorts of problems in the Bees area with the ball eventually being blasted off the bar from Callum Reynolds, somehow not going in.
Jerome Binnon-Williams had been a constant threat down the left hand side and with ten minutes to go, fizzed a dangerous cross along the ground, which just evaded any of the Bees oncoming forwards.
But, with 6 minutes to go, the Bees had a chance to equalise after Elliott Johnson handled the ball in the area. The resulting penalty was calming placed in the bottom right hand corner of the goal by Hooper, setting up an exciting finale to the game.
After being behind for the majority of the game, The Bees suddenly found themselves in front, less than 3 minutes after equalising, when Richards tried yet again from outside the box with an effort on goal, which just crept its way past Justham.
The Daggers though didn’t give up on getting something from the game, getting themselves a flurry of corners, which they were unable to make much of and with that the Bees claimed all three points.
Barnet Team: Loach, Preston, Dunne, McQueen, Richards (Duffus 90+1′), Hooper, Taylor, Fonguck, Binnon-Williams, Mason-Clark (Pavey 71′), Nugent
POST MATCH REACTION:
