Beer Albion booked their place in the next round of the East Devon Senior Cup with an unconvincing 2-1 victory over Exmouth Town Reserves writes Mike Adkin. The Town’s second string arrived at the Furzebrake goalless, having been well beaten in their opening four Premier League games, but the Fishermen struggled to stamp their authority on the game, and in the end were relieved to hear the final whistle. Beer opened the scoring on nine minutes with a rare goal from the ever willing Shaun Denslow, but the pattern for the game was emerging, the homesters enjoying more possession, but too many long high balls forward, and the final ball lacking the required accuracy. Exmouth then drew level on 26 minutes when young keeper Elliot Driver saw yellow after bringing down an attacker in the box. Driver was unlucky not to get a full hand to the resulting well struck penalty to his right, but the Town celebrated their first goal of the season. The visitors then started to trouble the Fishermen’s defence with some pacey breaks from midfield, but on 38 minutes Beer restored their lead when Ed Karpajev picked up the ball on the right hand side of the visitor’s box, and rifled a shot across the goal and in at the far post. Chris Long then hit the woodwork on 41 minutes, but the Albion were relieved to go in ahead at the break. The second half saw the game continue in the same vein, with Beer unable to stamp their authority on proceedings, but they could have put the game beyond doubt on 82 minutes, when a well struck volley from Simon Smith 30 yards out just whistled past the Exmouth keeper’s left hand post. Man of the match was awarded to Beer’s John Cooper by match sponsor Woozie’s Deli of Beer, with Chris Watts the pick of the Exmouth players. Next up for the Fishermen is a home league match this coming Saturday against unbeaten Newtown, with the game to be sponsored by Bessie Mai’s of Beer.