BURY 1 TRANMERE ROVERS 0

DIVISION One's 'ugly ducklings' have found a Swan to make them more beautiful!

The Shakers' crash, bang, wallop style has become their trademark since they arrived on the First Division stage and no one epitomises it more than 30-year-old Peter Swan, a real life gamekeeper turned poacher.

Swan had spent five successive years trying to prevent goals before moving to Gigg Lane from Burnley, now he has scored twice in as many outings and, ironically, that is two more than the entire Turf Moor side have managed this season! His latest piece of plundering came on Sunday (Sept 7) in the 42nd minute of a game high on endeavour but not over-blessed with moments of great quality.

It was fitting, then, that the goal should be created by Andy Gray who again showed that he is in the kind of form that would allow him to walk into any other side in the section and many in the Premiership.

Thirty-three year-old Gray possesses speed, strength and skill in equal measure and he used all three attributes to create the opening that led to Swan's winner.

Even the most ardent of gambler wouldn't have bet on Gray emerging with the ball as Tranmere's former England international Gary Stevens and long-serving veteran midfielder Kenny Irons ushered him towards the right hand corner flag.

Gray thought different, and one dummy, one Cruyff turn and a couple of bursts of pace later he emerged inside the Rovers penalty area from where he laid the ball back to Paul Butler. The grateful Bury defender let fly from 30 yards out and when his low, raking drive was blocked, Swan turned neatly on to the loose ball and drilled a 15-yarder past a helpless Danny Coyne.

It was no more than Bury deserved, for, in David Johnson, they had the game's outstanding forward and had always looked the more likely to score.

Johnson who is improving with every game, burst through a series of woeful Rovers' challenges in the ninth minute but was off balance when he shot and lashed the ball 10 yards over the bar. He would have been a lot closer with a 13th minute effort had full back Andy Thompson not dived in the way at the last second.

Tranmere's one and only chance of a first half they will want to quickly forget, came in the 35th minute when Thompson and Lee Jones found too much space in the Bury area and the latter floated over a dangerous cross that Graham Branch, once on loan at Gigg Lane, scooped over from five yards.

Bury's 4-3-3 formation allowed Gray, aided and abetted by the tireless Nick Daws and Lenny Johnrose, to control matters from the middle of the pitch and that, in turn, meant the home side always had the upper hand. Whatever John Aldridge said at half time cannot have been very complimentary and his red-eared side showed up rather better in a more spirited second half performance.

Branch came close to an equaliser in the 52nd minute but Dean Kiely, until then a virtual spectator, tipped over his dipping header.

Bury replied through Tony Battersby who worked a fine opening down the right before chipping to the far post where no one was on had to apply the finishing touch.

Johnson kept Tranmere's defence on its toes with a low shot in the 67th minute before the two managers played their tactical cards.

Stan Ternent, the Bury boss, perhaps sensing that Rovers were getting too much of the ball, sent on midfielder Adrian Randall in place of Battersby in the 68th minute and the Shakers immediately adopted a more cautious 4-4-2 formation.

Flu victim Aldridge replied, four minutes later, by withdrawing Stevens and Irons - who were probably still glassy-eyed from watching Gray wriggle past them - and playing with three at the back.

Gray's lung-bursting 86th minute run to the goal-line ought to have ended with a goal but as Swan moved to the near post, so Gray chipped to the empty space behind and no one in a white shirt had been able to keep up and so usher the ball into a gaping goal.

Bury's unbeaten home league run now stretches to 28 games and Sunday's result left Rovers with one win from 21 visits to Gigg Lane.

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