Tuesday 8th July 2025. Pre Season Friendly. Retford United (0) 0 v. Mansfield Town (1) 6 (Will Evans 23, Dom Dwyer 47, 65, Kyle McAdam 69, Elliott Hewitt 76, Mitch Tait OG 86). Attendance: 1,444
The Stags began their Pre-Season preparations with what has become an annual event for Nigel Clough's League 1 side; a visit to Cannon Park, to take on Retford United. The Badgers ply their trade in the United Counties League, Division One North these days, but Ryan Hindley’s side are among the favourites to be vying for promotion this coming season.
The Badgers chairman Nik Springthorpe announced during the game that tonight’s impressive attendance of 1,444 constituted a new crowd record for United, a ‘fact’ I initially repeated on my Twitter feed. But that was subsequently corrected, so hey ho! Having investigated the matter further, I unearthed the following snippet from the ever reliable resource that is the NCEL website. So now we know… and so does Mr Springthorpe!
Note, the Derek Asamoah listed amongst the Donny Rovers scorers is the same player that scored five goals in thirty appearances for the Stags during the 2004-05 season. Some Northampton Town supporting friends of mine had nicknamed Asamoah: ‘Twenty minute Derek’, because they reckoned that was the maximum time that he contributed any worthwhile input whenever he played for them, prior to moving to Field Mill.
If that unkind sobriquet was based on any kind of fact, then obviously pacing ones-self and conserving energy increases your longevity in the game, because he is still registered as a player for Haringey Borough these days, at the grand old age of 44. Incidentally, he played one hundred and twelve times for the Cobblers, before joining Mansfield and actually won four international caps for Ghana, which kind of suggests that he can't have been all bad.
Asamoah left Mansfield and moved to Lincoln City when he fell out with Carlton Palmer, who for some strange reason (AKA he was a big pal of the dodgy chairman they had back then) was managing the Stags, albeit briefly (but not briefly enough). Note* there is a Ryan Oates listed on the board pictured above, as playing at number 10 for the visitors, this was actually Rhys Oates, not another new player.
Four or five chances had already gone begging for the visitors, as the Badgers defended with an all hands to the pumps determination, while DJ Smith guarded his goal in a manner that suggested he had morphed into Octopus-man for the evening; before Mansfield finally took the lead in the twenty-third minute. Louis Reed put Regan Hendry through on goal with a slide rule pass, but Smith blocked the resulting effort on goal, alas the ball fell kindly for Will Evans who slotted the ball home from ten yards out before the Octopus guy had time to recover his footing.
To their credit, in spite of having to field over probably (at least) a dozen attempts on their goal, the hosts worked hard to keep the half-time deficit down to just 0-1. Of course the combination of this being a friendly on a very warm night, meant a whole lot of substitutions entered the fray before the restart, including the entire Mansfield team in a prearranged swap. DJ Smith was amongst the numerous United players to be replaced during the interval… he’d earned a rest!
Retford United supporters of a squeamish disposition might want to look away now. The second-half was entirely played out in one half of the pitch, but it mostly was. Two minutes in and Dom Dwyer leapt a yard in the air to steer the ball inside the near post from Elliott Hewitt’s knock across the.six-yard box from his right. Sensing the game was about to slip away from them, the hosts pushed forward… with Brandon Kane and Callum Orange both going close to halving the deficit.
But, Mansfield began to turn the screw and dominate the game, pretty much as you would expect from them with a line-up that was top-heavy with first-team players. Kyle McAdam, who is at the Stags on a season-long loan from Nottingham Forest, got on the end of Guyanan international Nathan Moriah-Welsh’s right-wing delivery and headed it down for Dwyer, who spanked home his second goal of the game from close range in the sixty-fifth minute.
Four minutes later, McAdam added a fourth fir the Stags when he steered home Dwyer’s cross with his right foot after trapping the ball with his left. There was a touch of good fortune about the Stags fifth-goal when McAdam cut inside on the left and drilled a low-cross across the face of the Badgers goal that was hooked away but rebounded into the net off of Hewitt… they all count, eh!?
Inside the final four minutes, McAdam drilled a shot in the general direction of the home sides goal, that appeared to he going just wide of the upright, until it took a deflection off of United’s Mitch Tait and ended up in the net. Fashion icon Aaron Lewis was initially credited with the goal, but Tait had prevented the ball from reaching him with his ‘untimely’ interjection, so sorry Mitch, it’s an own goal. Stags U21 player Jakub Kruszynskialmo almost added a seventh goal right at the death, but that would just have been being greedy. FT: Retford United 0 v Mansfield Town 6