History maker Waites

A Paul Waites special laid the Rebels' 15 year bogey at Croydon Sports Arena on Saturday. His second half cracker gave Slough their first win in 12 attempts in SE 25 and clinched their fourth successive victory.

And although not achieved in the same buccaneering style that brought the convincing triumphs over Hitchin and Tooting, manager Alan Davies was naturally delighted with another three points. " It's always difficult here, but more than half the places you have to go into in the league are like that. You've got to battle and hopefully, the skill will show through at the end of the day. I think we did enough to win today and we are happy with three points when we didn't play as well as we know we can".

Thunder and lightning before kick-off and heavy rain after, made the Croydon Sports Arena even more grim than usual. With the athletics track distancing the players from what is usually a sparse crowd, it's a trip never relished by fans, players or even the press!

But still, the Rebels fans easily outnumbered the home patrons among the 120-odd paying customers and they witnessed the weather of all four seasons during the 90 minutes - if hardly a great football match.

Wilson and McMahon returned after missing the Windsor win, so Wanklyn was again on the side lines. And competition for places on the tiny bench meant assistant manager Graham Cox and physio Brian Burke spent the first half huddled under an umbrella, as they watched the Rebels pay Croydon respect they didn't deserve.

But the Blues just didn't have the skill or imagination to do anything to really pressurise the Slough defence and 'keeper Bunting was hardly troubled throughout the entire 90 minutes. In Slough's first decent opening, Paterson presented Waites with the ball, but the Slough man wanted to walk the ball in the net instead of shooting first time and squandered the opportunity to convert the one-against-one situation.

Wilson, who didn't seem fully fit after his leg injury, crossed for Brown, but the top scorer's flying header was narrowly off target. Just before the end of the first period, Stanley also forced Gray to make a save after finding himself with bags of time and space on the edge of the box.

With Croydon's two first choice 'keepers sunning themselves in Spain, Slough really should have put debutant Julian Gray under more pressure, but nevertheless, were producing some good football with MacMahon their playmaker-in-chief.

A first half full of "if only's" was suitably concluded when Blackman got past Bateman, but could only shoot into Bunting's side netting. MacMahon got an elbow on the chin soon after the restart and needed extensive treatment to a nasty cut, but resumed as the Rebels started to assert themselves more.

After Bunting was twice called into action, Brown and Waites had half chances before the latter struck decisively after 72 minutes. Stanley found Waites on the edge of the area and he jinked inside a defender and let fly with a sweetly-struck shot which appeared to clip Daly's heel on its way past Gray.

It was Waites' second of the season and just reward for the Rebels, who were clearly more dominant in the second half. Subs Wanklyn and Davis came on for the final 11 minutes and they combined to set up Stanley, but although he again couldn't find the killer touch Slough were never in danger of surrendering their advantage.