Bateman takes charge at Dynamos

A new era has dawned at Aylesbury Vale Dynamos.

Former Hemel Hempstead Town assistant-manager Steve Bateman has been named as the club’s new boss following the departure of Phil Granville.

Bateman was on hand to watch at the weekend as director of football Ryan Collings took charge of the team and led them to their third win of the season in the Spartan South Midlands League Premier Division.

And it was an emphatic one as they claimed a thumping 5-0 success at Broadfields.

They opened the scoring after just two minutes when Jake Baldwin raced through and beat the home goalkeeper.

It was 2-0 soon after as Callum Shortt sidestepped his marker and curled the ball into the bottom corner.

Dynamos went 3-0 up with Baldwin again on target with a low shot and his brace was matched by Shortt who made it 4-0 from a Baldwin cross on 58 minutes.

But it was Baldwin who stole the headlines when he completed the scoring and his hat-trick after latching on to Alfi Touceda’s pass.

Bateman is now set to take charge of the team for the first time when they host New Salamis on Saturday.

Risborough Rangers maintained their unbeaten record in the Spartan South Midlands League Premier Division with a five-star display at Hadley.

Earlier in the week, manager Mark Eaton had rung the changes for the Berks & Bucks Senior Cup clash at Milton United.

Sam Pekun and Brian Haukle were on target but Rangers were held to a 2-2 draw before losing 4-1 in the resulting penalty shoot-out.

But there was no mistake as they returned to league duty at the weekend.

Hadley hadn’t been beaten at home in a league fixture since December 15, 2018 and they looked like they might overrun their visitors in the first 15 minutes as Rangers struggled to keep any kind of possession.

However, it was Rangers who took the lead when Marcus Wyllie played a neat one-two with Kieran Schmidt before setting up Liam Enver-Marum for a close-range finish.

The lead was doubled five minutes later when a defence-splitting pass from new signing Ben Sturgess picked out Schmidt who feinted before hitting a superlative strike with the outside of his left boot into the far corner of the Hadley goal.

Captain Joel Read had the ball in the net only to see his effort ruled out for offside but Rangers had to withstand some pressure in the second half with both Josh Urqhuart and Read in excellent form in the middle of the back line.

Rangers almost made it three with Schmidt winning a tackle deep in Hadley territory before hitting the post with a cheeky chip.

However, they did grab a third when Wyllie came off best in a 50-50 challenge before racing away and finishing well.

The game was up for the hosts when Enver-Marum picked himself up to score from the penalty spot after he was fouled and he went on to complete his hat-trick when Asher Yearwood’s shot was parried to him.

This was Rangers’ sixth win from seven matches, the other being a draw, and leaves them second in the table ahead of a home clash with Arlesey Town on Saturday (3pm), which is then followed by a trip to MK Irish next Tuesday night (7.45pm).