Away day joy as City overcome Havant

Goals from Jack Batten, Cody Cooke and Alex Fletcher saw City beat Havant & Waterlooville 3-1 at Westleigh Park this afternoon. The opening exchanges were disrupted by several injuries for both sides but when the game settled down it was the Romans who struck first on 19 minutes, Batten heading into the net from an Elliott Frear free-kick. The hosts thought they had equalised on the half hour mark but it was ruled out for a foul on Ryan Clarke. However, five minutes later they were level, McCarthy heading a high cross back across goal for Wright to nod home. City restored their lead a minute before the interval when Joe Raynes won possession before finding Cooke who fired into the roof of the net for his 12th goal of the season. And after weathering pressure from Havant at the start of the second half City struck again on 57 minutes. A short corner routine by Frear and Mo Touray saw the former lift the ball to the edge of the area where Fletcher steered a perfect volley into the bottom corner. Havant almost pulled a goal back three minutes later but Eddie Jones did enough to prevent Wright netting after Clarke could only parry an initial shot. That was as close as the home side would come, with City largely restricting them to long-range efforts that rarely troubled Clarke, and with the clock ticking around to five o’clock the final whistle saw City secure a first league win on the road since mid September.