MALVERN Town continue to sit on the tails of leading Travel Factory Midland Alliance pair Rushall Olympic and Chasetown with a 2-3 win at lowly Oldbury Town, but they had to survive a nail-biting second half to do it.

OLDBURY TOWN 2, MALVERN TOWN 3

The visitors eased their way into a two-goal lead inside the first half hour when on 20 minutes a fine move between Tommy Callinan, Craig Williams and Nathan Jukes enabled Williams to pick out Duncan Preedy on the wide right. He in turn made ground before delivering a pin-point pass into the box for Dean Roberts to slide the ball home under pressure from Justin Brown and Martyn Green.

Five minutes later it was 0-2 when the lively Des Cox picked the ball up just outside the 18-yard box, jinked his way round central defender Martyn Green and rifled a shot just inside the post leaving home keeper Neil Olden a spectator.

Two minutes later it should have been 0-3 when Phil Preedy outstripped the home defence to lay the ball into the path of the unmarked Dean Roberts, but with a gaping goal in front of him he missed the target from eight yards out.

Oldbury tried hard to get back into the game but when they did get through, they found Paul Wyatt in the Town goal in confident mood and he dealt easily with the situation.

Oldbury started the second period in determined fashion and 10 minutes into the half reduced the arrears when a fine high ball into the Town box picked out substitute Ted Baylis. He rose high above Andy Chalmers to head home a picture goal into the top corner of the net.

This unsettled Malvern and Oldbury continued to put the pressure on. Rupert Taylor and then Ryan Edge had great chances to equalise but squandered them. However, in the 65th minute they did bring the scores level when Town failed to clear their lines and Richard Harris whipped-in a high cross to pick out Jason Barlow at the back post. He had the easiest of chances to find the net with Wyatt stranded.

Malvern started to get their act together after this and forced the home side back on the defensive. Roberts had a great chance to put town back in front but choose to shoot instead of making ground to give himself an easier target and Town substitute Simon Judge was adjudged offside with a clear sight of goal.

With ten minutes remaining however, Malvern went back in front when Judge picked out Phil Preedy on the edge of the 18-yard box. He side-stepped defender Danny Adams' lunge before rounding keeper Rowley to side-foot into an empty net.

Malvern's performance wasn't their best of the season, but at the end of the day they came away with the three points from an away game.