Wednesday, July 24, 2002

KIDDERMINSTER Harriers survived an injury scare over Scott Stamps in last night's 2-0 pre-season friendly defeat against Wolverhampton Wanderers reserves at Aggborough.

The Harriers defender was stretchered off in the 78th minute after falling awkwardly and damaging his left ankle.

Afterwards Aggborough boss Ian Britton revealed that the injury was not serious and mainly involved bruising.

Harriers were beaten by a goal in each half from Adam Proudlock.

The first came after 40 minutes while the second was from the penalty spot three minutes from time.

For Kidderminster it was another useful work-out, although they offered very little up front in a game which never really caught fire.

Britton said: "I thought second half we did a lot better. First half we were off the pace a bit. Although they never brought all their first team over they still had some decent players out there and they gave us a test.

"I'm quite pleased. I thought our passing wasn't very good generally, although second half it was a lot better. Our cutting edge was not very good at all, but I thought we did our actual defensive play particularly well.

"I'm not worried about the passing so much because I think some of them had an off day and I'm not worried about the cutting edge because I know the team we have got here can do that. They proved it last season. We can pass and we can create chances."

Wolves went ahead after Lee Ayres had failed to deal with a long ball by Mark Clyde and Colin Larkin, who spent a large chunk of last season on loan at Aggborough, squared for Proudlock to easily beat keeper Stuart Brock.

Proudlock sealed victory when he fired home a penalty which had been harshly awarded when Harriers newcomer Sean Parrish was adjudged to have handled a Ashley Vincent cross.

Kidderminster: Brock, Smith, Stamps (Joy 78), Ayres, Hinton, Williams, Bennett (Doyle 76), Ducros, Broughton, Foster (Lewis 68), Parrish. Subs (not used): Shilton, Henriksen, Corbett.

Attendance: 2,696.