Belper well beaten by Kevin Wilson's Boro

The National League North side handed Charlie Palmer’s men their first defeat of the summer.

Early on, Jonathan Williams stood over a free-kick just on the edge of the Nuneaton penalty area and curled the ball perfectly around the Nuneaton wall to find the bottom left corner of the goal and give Belper the lead.

However, it didn’t last very long, Nuneaton had just began to find their way into the game and were not giving up possession very regularly.

Nuneaton grabbed an equaliser when Billy Daniels took the ball down the right hand side before putting in a fantastic cross and Jack O’Brian turned the ball into his own net.

This soon became 2-1 to Nuneaton, a poor pass from Williams went straight to the feet of a Nuneaton forward who quickly broke away, slid the ball across to Shaq McDonald and he scored with a simple finish.

Unfortunately for Belper the goals would continue to pour in, Dominic Allen giving the ball away to David Mani who took it around Ross Parker and then slotted home into the bottom right corner.

Whenever Belper Town would get a chance to go forward, Nuneaton would counter attack very quickly and put the Nailers defenders under a lot of pressure.

In the 36th minute Nuneaton made the most of this, after a Belper Town corner, Nuneaton turned defence into attack very quickly and altough Danny Haystead saved the initial effort, Daniels tapped the rebound into the open goal to make it 4-1.

Just a couple of minutes later Nuneaton found themselves counter attacking again, McDonald got the ball inside the Nailers penalty area and fired past Haystead.

The half would end 5-1, an extremely disappointing start by Belper Town.

Palmer made a couple of changes, Alex Steadman came off as the Nailers went into a 4-4- 2 diamond formation in a hope to keep the ball better and have more control in the midfield.

This seemed to work for Palmer’s side as they kept possession a lot better and when Nuneaton did counter attack, the hosts did seem to get more men behind the ball and did so more quickly.

Belper Town did limit Nuneaton to only one goal in the second half, a long ball came forward from a Nuneaton defender after a long period of Belper Town possession, Haystead did come out to get the ball however was beaten to it by McDonald who completed the rout.

Belper played much better in the second half but will realise that there is much room for improvement.