LUKE Salter’s goal early in the second half earned Malvern Town a hard-fought 1-0 victory against struggling Bashley.
Salter scored the game’s only goal on 46 minutes at the HDAnywhere Community Stadium as the Hillsiders claimed back-to-back victories in the league.
The result means Malvern sit seventh in the Southern League Division One South table, two points outside of the play-off places.
Bashley made a bright start, despite languishing in the relegation zone, and controlled the opening exchanges without creating a clear-cut chance.
Malvern worked their way into the contest as both Sam Clark and Levi Francis failed to make the most of half-chances.
The visitors carved out the best opening of the first half as Malvern goalkeeper Josh Bishop made a fine save to deny Toure Williams.
From the resulting corner, Bishop failed to gather the ball cleanly and Bashley turned the loose ball into the net only for the referee to rule out the goal for a foul on Malvern stopper Bishop.
The disallowed goal sparked Malvern into life as Bashley goalkeeper Lloyd Thomas held Dion Molyneux’s header.
Thomas then spilled Piers Walton’s cross into the box with Harry Clark unable to turn the ball home as the Bashley keeper recovered to block the Malvern man’s effort.
Malvern’s best chance of the first period arrived five minutes before half time with Salter just unable to make contact with Walton’s ball across the face of goal.
And Walton spurned another chance to break the deadlock in first-half injury time when he hooked a bouncing ball over Thomas but could not generate enough power on the strike as the latter recovered to prevent the ball from crossing the line.
However, Malvern broke the deadlock just one minute into the second period as Clark flicked a long throw into the danger zone and Salter pounced from five-yards out to find the net and put the home side ahead.
Salter spurned a glorious chance to double his tally for the game moments later as he hit the outside of the post when one-on-one with Thomas after good work from Walton.
Bashley stopper Thomas then tipped H Clark’s header over the crossbar at full stretch from Ben Baxter’s hanging cross.
The chances continued to come Malvern’s way as Francis dragged a shot wide and Salter sliced an effort off target while Lewis saw his strike deflected over the bar.
Substitute Ben Hayes almost made an instant impact just past the hour mark but could only slice wide from H Clark’s chip to the back post.
Bashley pushed for an equaliser in the closing stages as Bishop tipped James Martin’s effort to safety.
And the visitors came within inches of an equaliser in injury time when Harvey Bertrand’s header smashed against the post with Bishop rooted to the spot.
Bashley flooded the box at the death, sending up goalkeeper Thomas for a last gasp corner, as Bishop muscled his way through a crowd of players to punch the cross clear which secured the points for Lee Hooper’s side.
