Bury 3 Crystal Palace 0

IT was a case of sweet and sour as surprise packages Bury produced another stunning display to maintain their unbelievable start to the season.

It was a sweet victory for the Shakers giving them a comfortable cushion to take to next Wednesday's Worthington Cup second leg.

But for former England boss Terry Venables it all went sour as his side suffered not only a humiliating defeat but also lost the services of one of their new Chinese signings after just 18 minutes with a twisted ankle.

It was a cup tie Neil Warnock openly admitted he could have done without but his Bury marauders took it in their stride.

The Shakers boss was worried about injuries and the toll a heavy programme would take on his small squad, but they showed few ill-effects from playing their second game in three days.

Warnock has certainly found the magic touch since he took the reins at Gigg Lane in the close season, with everything he touches turning to gold.

"They had one chance which would have probably changed the whole match if they had gone in front, but we went down the other end and scored and really from then on we have done quite well," said Warnock.

"We could do without the competition though. We will get injuries and bookings and we can't afford them as we don't have a big squad."

Palace created much of the first-half play and had chances to score but it was the Shakers who came up trumps.

The third of a succession of corners opened the scoring in the eighth minute when Rob Matthews provided the cross for the unmarked Lennie Johnrose to head home. Matthews grabbed the second in the 25th minute when Nicky Daws' long clearance was headed on by target man Andy Preece and the striker blasted the ball into the roof of the net.

Keeper Dean Kiely had been the hero on Sunday when he saved an injury time penalty at Carrow Road, but he was much busier on Tuesday pulling off a string of saves to deny Attilio Lombardo, Marcus Bent and eye-catching England U21 international Matt Jansen.

It was Bury who struck what could be the decisive goal of the tie in the 57th minute when Matthews again combined with Johnrose from a corner for an action-replay of the first goal.

"It is not a move we have worked on in training, it just happened," admitted Johnrose. "On both occasions Preece drew the defender leaving me all on my own."

It was a night to forget for Palace's two debutantes, the first Chinese players to be involved in English football. Young Sun Jihai lasted just 18 minutes before he was stretchered off after turning an ankle, while his country's skipper Fan Zhiyi hardly impressed in a shaky Palace back four.

Manager Terry Venables confessed: "I wanted to give Andy Linighan a rest and give the Chinese lads a run-out, but in hindsight maybe this was not the game to do it."

Bury defender Andy Woodward has had a fortnight he would rather forget. He was sent off at Birmingham, gave away an injury time penalty at Norwich and lasted just 23 minutes before he had to leave the field with a recurrence of a hamstring strain.

Young defender Danny Swailes stepped into the breach at the heart of the defence and hardly put a foot wrong on his debut.

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