Norwich City - 2 Crewe Alex - 1

CREWE were unable to kick off the new campaign with a win despite clawing their way back into the match after going two goals down.

Norwich were anxious to impress new manager Bruce Rioch who was introduced to the fans prior to the game.

Crewe, beset by injury problems earlier in the week, had Lightfoot and Street in the starting line-up and Phil Charnock on the bench.

The hosts put a lot of pressure on the Alex defence early on with the speedy runs of Bellamy and O'Neil causing concern along with the craft of Darren Eadie.

It told after 31 minutes when Bellamy received the ball on the left. There was a suspicion of offside but no whistle sounded and he went on to beat Kearton with a powerful shot.

Just four minutes later the Alex found themselves two down when defender Darren Konlan linked up with the attack and hit an angled drive that gabe Kearton no chance.

Crewe reacted to the setback in the best possible way, pulling a goal back within a minute through Mark Rivers who capitalised on hesitancy in the Norwich defence.

There were no further goals in the second half with both sides tightening up and showing some determined play. The Crewe defence looked a lot more compact after the interval and they were able to mount some meaningful attacks but could not force the equaliser.

Onbly a fingertip save by Marshall denied Seth Johnson's long range drive and with just minutes left it looked like Rivers would get his second when he burst through but was foiled by the Norwich 'keeper.

Dario Gradi tried to shake things up using all his nominated substitutes - Smith for Street, Charnock for Johnson and finally Unsworth for Lightfoot - but Crewe were unable to salvage any points from the match.

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