Bury 3, Radcliffe Boro 0

TWO goals from the trusty right boot of Darren Bullock midway through the first half put the Shakers well on the way to a 3-0 victory over Radcliffe Boro on Wednesday evening.

The tenacious Shakers midfielder opened the scoring after 21 minutes with a calmly taken penalty after Boro's former Rochdale youngster James Price brought down Lutel James.

He then brought back memories of his goal-of-the-season strike against Sunderland with a terrific 30-yard piledriver that rocketed into the top corner of Steve Berryman's goal.

The Shakers had to wait until the 74th minute for their final goal when Andy Preece, who replaced the injured Laurent D'Jaffo early in the game, fired home after good work from Kemajl Avdiu on the right wing. Boss Neil Warnock used the now-annual clash against UniBond League neighbours Boro to give a run out to 18 of his first team squad and, underlining the size of the current staff, he still had Chris Swailes, Paul Barnes, Steve Redmond and Paul Reid on the touchline.

"That was an excellent workout," said Warnock.

"The lads have been running themselves silly in training so it was as if they were let off the leash, they were just glad to see a ball!

"There was a lot of good contributions. Andy Woodward didn't put a foot wrong at the back and I thought Lutel James looked a lot stronger than last year, as did Adrian Littlejohn.

"Ian Lawson was shattered after the pre-season training but there are a lot of good signs."

The nearest Boro went to scoring was just before half time when a well struck free kick from Levi Edwards brought a superb save out of Pat Kenny in the Bury goal.

A crowd of 498 watched the game.

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