Jim Bentley admits Morecambe rode their luck against Yeovil

Morecambe boss Jim Bentley said his side “rode their luck” as they took the three points with a tough 2-1 win over Yeovil.

After seeing the Shrimps survive a second-half Yeovil onslaught, Bentley admitted he was relieved to hang on for victory.

Bentley said: “We started off the game really well and scored two good goals but unfortunately missed a penalty which would have probably killed the game off.

“At 2-0 the opposition will always throw everything at you and that is what Yeovil did and they made us work really hard.

“We had to ride our luck at times and our keeper was excellent and made some superb saves so it was tough work but the important thing was we took the points.

“Yeovil put us under a load of pressure in the second half and I’m sure they will think they should have got something from the game but we held on and got the win which was what mattered.

“At the same time though there have been a lot of games this year where we have not got what we deserved, but today we had a bit of fortune which was probably overdue.”

Goals from Ajay Leitch-Smith and Rhys Oates gave the Shrimps the win with Olufela Odomola pulling one back late on for the Glovers, who dominated the second half.

Former Yeovil striker Leitch-Smith opened the scoring on 23 minutes with a fine goal after turning sharply in the box before curling a left-foot strike past Nathan Baxter.

The same Morecambe player had a chance for a second on 34 minutes after the Shrimps were awarded a soft penalty when Rhys Browne fouled Liam Mandeville, but his effort was well saved by Baxter.

The Shrimps did add a second three minutes after the break when Oates beat Baxter from 25 yards with a shot that took a wicked bounce over the Chelsea loanee.

Mark Halstead saved smartly from two superb Tom James free kicks before Olufela Olomola pulled one back on 68 minutes when he raced on to a long ball before lofting the ball over the Morecambe keeper.

Halstead made another fine save from the dangerous Wes McDonald before Omari Patrick hit a post and Shaun Donnellan wasted a glorious late chance for the visitors to deny them a point.

Yeovil manager Darren Way was disappointed not to have taken anything from the game.

He said: “With the amount of chances we had we can definitely count ourselves unlucky not to have come out of the game with anything and I don’t really know how we didn’t win the game.

“I think we counted 17 attempts on goal in the space of 25 minutes and we showed the quality we have going forward but it wasn’t to be today and we take it on the chin.

“I wasn’t happy with the goals we conceded because we could have done better for both but there were a lot of positives from the game that we have to take away with us.

“Even in the first half we had chances and if we had taken one of them it might have changed things but we have to keep believing but make sure we stay focused and concentrate on winning football matches.”