Words provided by Matt Friday - Falmouth Town

Boss Andrew Westgarth hailed the defensive performance of his Falmouth Town side after a 2-0 Western League Premier Division win over Welton Rovers.

The Bickland Park clash, Town's first on home soil for close to a month, was settled by Luke Brabyn's second-half double with one of his goals coming from the penalty spot.

It was a dominant showing from Westgarth's side as they restricted Welton, who travelled to the Duchy on a run of only one loss in seven games, to very few clear-cut chances. 

Home custodian Zach Telling, deputising for the suspended Ryan Barnes, was by far and away the quieter with Rovers gloveman Dominic Oakes and his replacement in the second period Chris Blammon, responsible for keeping the score at just 2-0 to Town. 

"They were tough conditions because although it was sunny, the pitch was sticky," Westgarth said at full-time. "Welton came here as one of the form sides in the league because they have only lost one game in seven so if I'm honest, I expected a bit more from them.

"We had Zach stepping in for Barnesy and he didn't have anything to do which is a testament to our back four.

"I thought we looked really solid all game and although we had a clean sheet, what I was most pleased with was our game management. It wasn't pretty at times but once we got the second goal, with them trying to disrupt things, we kept our composure and looked really professional in the last 15 minutes.

"We saw the game out and it looked relatively easy but at the start of the season, we were frantic and throwing leads away. Today we looked like an established Western League side."

Brabyn was guilty of passing up a glorious chance after just 90 seconds when he fired over inside the box as the impressive Ryan Downing and Scott Kellow also came close to breaking the deadlock inside the first half.

After the turnaround, Brabyn was once again in range early in the piece and this time he made no mistake to fire home a sixth goal of the season.

This strike seemed to leave Town with further fire in their collective bellies while Welton were visibly deflated at conceding so early and Westgarth was keen to acknowledge the importance of an early goal. 

"Throughout the season, first goals are so important, especially at this level of football," he added. "It was a great team move with the ball into Barner, he turned it round the corner to Brabyn and he scored.

"It gives us momentum and with the crowd behind us, we had all the attacking play and 2-0 flattering them to be honest."

Just nine minutes after Town took the lead, the hosts were then presented with an opportunity to further strengthen their grip on proceedings from the penalty spot.

Brabyn was crudely upended by towering Welton defender Joe Garland and with assistant referee Scott Coutts placing his flag across his chest, the man with the whistle Kevin Hoare pointed to the spot and this infuriated Welton.

Player by player they took it in turns to remonstrate with the referee and Blammon was booked for kicking the ball away. When order was finally restored after a near five-minute delay, Brabyn, with ice running through his veins, calmly tucked home.

This shouldn't have been the only penalty that went Town's way as Downing seemed to be fouled in the box just before the break and once again with time ticking down towards the end of the game.

Although Westgarth felt that the referee got the incident that resulted in the second Town goal correct, he felt his side should have had more, whilst questioning Welton's actions when Mr Hoare did award the only penalty of the match. 

"On another day we could have had three or four (penalties) but I did think it was a penalty to be fair," he revealed. "Brabyn got their first and old boy left his leg out.

"You don't need the aftermath though and it was almost like every single Welton player took it in turns to have their say to the referee. 

"Fair play to the linesman, because he gave it and stuck to his guns. The carry-on was relentless and I don't know why players get involved so much because the referee isn't going to change his mind."