Fleetwood Town 0-0 Barnsley
Fleetwood Town bounced back from a run of two consecutive away defeats to draw 0-0 with Barnsley on their return to Highbury.Both sides had chances to win with Dale Jennings looking lively for the visitors while Josh Morris was denied a last minute winner as his free-kick from 22 yards hit the crossbar.
Ahead of kick-off Graham Alexander named an unchanged team from the weekend’s defeat away to Crawley Town at the Broadfield Stadium.
It was the visitors though who had the first chance in the sixth minute. One-time Bayern Munich youngster Jennings hit a shot from the edge of the Town box which was blocked for a corner by Stephen Jordan.
From then on in the first half it was one-way traffic as Fleetwood pushed for an opener.
First, in the 10th minute, Stephen Dobbie played Gareth Evans in one-on-one with Adam Davies in the Barnsley goal only to see his finish stopped by the keeper’s legs.
Eight minutes later and Matty Blair let go with a speculative effort from 30 yards which flew over Davies’ bar.
The Tykes then threatened to open the scoring just after the half hour as Kane Hemmings broke down the right wing before centring the ball to Jennings who had his effort blocked by a committed Nathan Pond.
As the half-time whistle approached the Cod Army were back in control and had two more opportunities to go into the break ahead.
In the 37th minute, after exchanging passes with Jamie Proctor Dobbie wriggled past Jean-Yves M’Voto but Town were again thwarted by Davies.
On the stroke of half-time Dobbie was again involved in some positive build-up play slotting the ball through for Blair who could not quite find the bottom corner as his shot bobbled wide.
After the restart it was Barnsley turn to attack as both Jennings and Devante Cole spurned good chances.
Jennings was first to try his luck in the 54th minute. The ex-Tranmere Rovers trainee did well to work room for a shot from the edge of the box unleashing a thunderous drive which crashed against Chris Maxwell’s crossbar.
Three minutes later and Cole was played in by his strike partner Hemmings forcing Maxwell into a brilliant save before Hemmings put the rebound over the bar.
Having been on the back foot Alexander decided to shuffle his pack bringing David Ball on for Dobbie in the 69th minute.
Ball certainly brought life back into the Town performance as the Cod Army then began to reassert themselves on proceedings.
Seven minutes after Ball arrival Blair fed the ball through for Evans who, from a tight angle, opted to drive the ball across the six yard box looking for a teammate but was unable to pick anyone out.
Moments later and a similar chance presented itself as Proctor capitalised on a weak header by M’Voto but after playing it into the six yard box Ball was unable to get a telling touch.
With 12 minutes left on the clock, Schumacher then came closest from Town as he whistled a 25 yard free-kick narrowly past Davies’ left-hand post.
Finally for the Cod Army, with just a minute of play remaining Jamie Proctor picked the ball up from deep and ran at M’Voto committing the dominant defender into fouling him.
From the resulting free-kick Morris stepped up and saw his effort beat both the wall and goalkeeper only to hit the upright.
Ex-Reading striker Leroy Lita, a late substitute for Barnsley, had the final chance in added time but blazed over after being found at the back post.