Match Preview: Southern League Premier South
\nBasingstoke Town vs Tiverton Town
\nWhen: Saturday 18th April 2026 Kick-off 3pm
\nWhere: Winklebury Centre, Winklebury Way, Basingstoke. RG23 8BF
\nTiverton Town (Tivvy\/Yellows), 2025-26 Curr League Position 22nd
\n<\/b>
\nThe win at Hungerford Town last Saturday, not only put the final nail in Hungerford\u2019s stay in step 3 football, but also put us one more vital step closer to safety with the win.
\nWe now host another club doomed to step 4 football in Tiverton Town, who we finally got round to playing, last month down in Devon. The game got off to an explosive start with goals in the opening two minutes. This was followed by two further first-half goals which included Max Herbert\u2019s first of hopefully many hat-tricks for the club. Although we failed to add to the total in the second-half, this was our first win for eleven matches, and a step to our revival.<\/p>\n
Our Opponents<\/b>
\nTiverton as they hit the final few games of playing in the Southern Premier South, are still led by Player\/Manager Asa Hall, who has had to deal with off-field club financial issues, which has affected his match-day squad throughout the season.<\/p>\n
Tiverton, continue to struggle to score goals, and after being thumped (0-8) and (0-6) in their last two matches, they have now conceded over 100 goals this season, and are rock-bottom in the league, with their record at Pld 39 Won 5 Drawn 3 Lost 31 and 18pts. Their away record sits at just 2 Wins, 2 Draws and 16 Losses. Tiverton, continue to struggle to score goals, averaging under one goal a game, yet concede over 2\u00bd goals a game. One remaining striker is Aiden Horne, who now has four goals, who rejoined the club from local side Cullompton Rangers. With him is Jacob Wellington, who has two goals, and is a former Torquay academy player, who joined from Willand last summer. Forward Fletcher Poole, just 18, joined on loan last week from Plymouth Argyle. Charlie Wright is another recent arrival, and plays on the left.<\/p>\n
The midfield contains Player-Manager Asa Hall, who now has four goals and joined after six seasons at Torquay United. He has amassed over 600 competitive games in a 19-year career that began at Premier League Birmingham City and has included seven EFL clubs. Toby Stephens, rejoined the club last month, after spending time across the Devon border at Taunton. He\u2019s a former Southampton academy product who started at Yeovil Town, and has also played at AFC Totton & Hungerford Town. Gabe Billington, has signed permanently this summer, after making 17 appearances, whilst on loan last season from Exeter City, and has three goals to-date. Jack Kennell(19) joined from Exmouth Town, after beginning in the youth set up with Torquay United before moving to Willand Rovers in the summer of 2024. Another 18-year-old, who joined on-loan last week is midfielder, Sam Lord, and he has started most games since his arrival.<\/p>\n
Matthew Wood is their current team captain, and is regarded as a commanding centre back, after joining the Yellows last summer from Frome Town. Brooklyn Wilkins is the right-back, having impressed on trial during pre-season. Brooklyn previously with Plymouth Marjon, Tavistock & Camelford. Corey Koerner is a left-sided defender, who joined the Yellows this summer following his departure from Yeovil Town. Josh Ross continues to be the keeper between the sticks.<\/p>\n
Our Basingstoke Town Side
\n<\/b>The win last week at Hungerford, although it took until the last five minutes of normal time to put the game out of doubt, it now puts us in a strong position, to not only remain comfortably away from the relegation places, but also potentially give us a mid-table final position. Two further goals from Ore Bello, one from a fortunate penalty award, now give him three goals in the last two games, and four for the season. Our other goal was about determination by Robbie Gallagher, who helped set-up Joe Grant\u2019s quality finish to put the game to bed. NB: That was our twelfth penalty conversion of the season, which could be a Basingstoke record?
\nWith other teams around us picking up points also last Saturday, we remain in fifteenth place, but with an expected three points tomorrow afternoon, we could climb higher. Our record sits at Pld 40 Won 13 Drawn 9 Lost 18 and 48pts. Our home record now stands at 8 Wins, 4 draws & 8 losses.<\/p>\n
Our strikeforce contained Joe Grant, Robbie Gallagher, Ore Bello & George Reid last week, and this should be pretty much the starters once more, with potentially Dan Rowe & Cheick Sylla the other options. Could Dan Rowe be given a start, rather than as an oncoming substitute.
\nCheick Sylla\u2019s, injury status is unclear, so at best he could make the bench.<\/p>\n
With a weak opponent in Hungerford last week, we was able to relax the strength in midfield, which Josh Green led, and looked dominant, and received strong support from strikers tracking back, but also with a more fluid defensive back five, that had time to push into midfield situations on numerous occasions. We did bring on our midfielders on in the second-half, but again fairly late in the game. Lloyd Snell replaced George Reid, and then D\u2019Andre Brown and even later Ben Cook, were used to solidify the middle after we had found that third goal. We could go with this option again, although Tiverton generally pack their midfield each game.<\/p>\n
Our defence looked strong for large parts of the game, against a pretty weakened Hungerford forward-line, with their only goal from long-range, and a little possession around our penalty-area, midway through the second-half. This allowed both defensive backs to push forward numerous times, especially when kicking downhill in the first-half. Scott Armsworth was also noticeably in a more advanced role on a number of occasions. Whether this will change tomorrow, depends on how attacking we look to set-up, against Tiverton. What we do know is that Jack Ball will once play alongside our captain Billy Upton, whilst Zach Ioannides and Joe O\u2019Loughlin will operate along the wings once more. James Clark was a late used sub, and played in a more attacking role, whilst Elliott Legg was not part of the matchday squad. Simon Grant, like the defence had one of his more quieter times between the sticks recently, and this should be the same tomorrow afternoon.<\/p>\n
Whilst Tiverton must be counting the minutes to the end of this season, Basingstoke must be looking to put this game away early, and if our last match-up, and Tiverton\u2019s latest results are the current expectation, then surely the Stoke strikeforce should be licking their lips, for our final home game of the season.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s Go Stoke !<\/p>\n
Match Preview by Martin French..<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Match Preview: Southern League Premier South Basingstoke Town vs Tiverton Town When: Saturday 18th April 2026 Kick-off 3pm Where: Winklebury Centre, Winklebury Way, Basingstoke. RG23 8BF Tiverton Town (Tivvy\/Yellows), 2025-26 Curr League Position 22nd The win at Hungerford Town last Saturday, not only put the final nail in Hungerford\u2019s stay in step 3 football, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7654,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[95,107,108,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9087","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-2023-24-news","category-2025-26-match-preview","category-2025-26-news","category-featured"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/Tiverton-Town.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9087","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9087"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9087\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9088,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9087\/revisions\/9088"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9087"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9087"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9087"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}