Thurlow Nunn Premier: Thetford Town 0-2 Mulbarton Wanderers

20th December 2025

Thetford Town vs Mulbarton Wanderers @ The Lomax Spiral Systems Stadium - Thetford

Thurlow Nunn Premier (Step 5)

15:00 KO

£8 entry

Attendance - TBA

Half-time score: Thetford Town 0-0 Mulbarton Wanderers

Goals:

Mulbarton Wanderers: Lane - 56'

Mulbarton Wanderers: Imessaoudene - 77'

Final Score: Thetford Town 0-2 Mulbarton Wanderers

With Thetford Town's 2-0 victory away at Kirkley & Pakefield last weekend, they had secured 4 wins in the bounce to cement their place in the tightly contested play-offs. However, stretching this to 5-on-the-spin was going to be very difficult as they hosted the divisions run away leaders, and a well-known opponent in Mulbarton Wanderers. They have been scoring for fun, and had a goal difference of +40 before kick-off. With Thetford unable to field any centre-backs, it was set-up to be a tough afternoon, but thankfully the Mulbarton top scorer Ashley Jarvis was unable to start. Haylett was set to start for Thetford, but something wasn't right in the warm-up so Laker stepped into the starting line-up.

Today's festive themed programme had prolific striker George Diggens on the front cover, who recently became a father, so big congratulations to him and his family.

It was a mild and dry afternoon, with low lying winter sun at the start of the game. Thetford Town lined-up in their claret & blue home kit, with Mulbarton Wanderers in a fluorescent orange away kit. The Thetford Town Ultra's were behind the oppositions goal, making a good amount of noise with the new drum sourced by club chairman Nigel Armes, keep up the great work lads!

KEY MOMENTS

TT = Thetford Town

MW = Mulbarton Wanderers

20' - TT - Thetford with the first decent chance of the game, Buttle on the left plays a ball into Ebanks-Blake, he cleverly leaves it and it travels through to King, this has the Mulbarton defence on the back-foot, King strides forwards, drops his shoulder to round the defender, and seeing Harvey Lott unmarked coming in off the right flank he squares the ball. But a Mulbarton defender gets an outstretched boot on the ball to intercept, an important touch from the defender preventing Thetford being 1-on-1 with their keeper.

37' - TT - Thetford break through Ebanks-Blake and he has numbers in support, seeing the danger a cynical tackle comes in to take him out. The player rightfully receives a yellow, but Mulbarton may well think it was well worthwhile to halt the dangerous Thetford attack in its tracks. A crunching challenge it was too, Ebanks-Blake was down for a while, but fortunately he was able to continue.

44' - MW - Mulbarton's first decent chance of the 1st half comes courtesy of a corner, Lane whips the ball in to the near-post where he finds the rangey midfield Lopez, he powers in a firm header forcing Pride to make an acrobatic save, pushing the ball out for another corner.

45'+2' - MW - Another chance for Mulbarton coming from a corner, the ball is left to bounce in the middle and it pops up for Lopez whose side-footed effort is blocked close to the line.

56' - MW - GOAL (0-1) - Mulbarton turn up the pressure in the 2nd half, and are rewarded with the opening goal of the game. A free-kick is pumped into the box, it is initially cleared, but Lane picks it up on the edge of the box, he shuffles side-to-side before drilling the ball through the crowd and into the bottom right corner.

63' - MW - Mulbarton with yet another good chance from a corner. The ball launched out to the far side, Lopez misses the ball but Nyadzayo is behind him, his snap volley whistles just over the bar, close!

77' - MW - GOAL (0-2) - Mulbarton with the all important 2nd goal, Lane from the left scythes through the Thetford defence, he lays the ball off to substitute Imessaoudene just inside the box and he blasts it into the roof of the net, giving Pride no chance at all.

88' - TT - Thetford continue to look to pull a goal back and get very close, a neat ball is curled in by Laker, he finds Billy Batch open at the far-post, he heads the ball across goal but it flies just wide, unlucky! Had that gone in it would have set-up a frantic finale.

Thetford Town started the day well, a solid first half keeping the league leaders very quiet bar a couple of corners late in the half. The second half was a different story however, Mulbarton stepped it up a notch, urged on by a brilliant performance from Owen Lane who bagged the opening goal, inspiring him to turn on the class, running through the Thetford defence with ease at times, as was seen for the 2nd goal, although the finish was brilliant from the tall substitute Imessaoudene. Thetford kept trying to peg one back, but the solid organised Mulbarton defence held firm. Despite the disappointing result, Thetford Town can hold their heads-up high, Mulbarton certainly knew they were in a game today, and Thetford held up well at the back considering a lack of centre-back options today, the division leaders had very few clear cut chances. Even so, it was clear that Mulbarton are a team currently playing at a higher level, the size and physicality paired with dangerous forwards is a recipe for success. With this game finished it means we have now played each other twice in the league this season, and should Mulbarton Wanderers win the league, as is looking likely, we may not play each other for a while, unless we can join them in promotion of course. In any case, there have been some memorable games between our two clubs over the past few seasons, and some controversial ones, but nevertheless I wish them all the best. Only a week to wait until the next game where Thetford Town host a Lakenheath side full of familiar faces, but before then it is Christmas so I wish everyone a Merry Christmas full of good cheer, UP THE TOWN!!!

Line-Ups:

THETFORD TOWN: Elliot Pride, Adam Laker, Elliot Smith (C), Billy Batch, Jeorgy Batch, Dylan Grove, Cameron King, Callum Olpin, Jordan Buttle, Harvey Lott, Antwan Ebanks-Blake. SUBS: George Diggens, Jake Mann, Daniel Rayner, Matt Morton.

MULBARTON WANDERERS: Tom Wright, Kieran Smith, Tom Hunter, George Watts-Sturrock, James Page (C), Chris Skipper, Ben Jones, Miguel Lopez, Cruise Nyadzayo, Owen Lane, Charlie Barber. SUBS: Angus Mackie, Sammy Imessaoudene, Joe Easton, Joshua Ikem, Ryan Crisp.