Taunton Town secured a hard-fought 1–0 victory over Enterprise National League South’s Chippenham Town at the Cygnet Health Care Stadium, extending their strong pre-season form and recording a sixth win and fifth clean sheet of the summer campaign.

The first sign of danger came from the away side, with Freddie Grant striking from the edge of the area on five minutes, but returning keeper Frankie Phillips gathered comfortably.

The first glimpse of Owen Brain’s positive first half performance came on 12 minutes when he spun past two blue shirts and expertly dinked the ball into the path of the onrushing Ben Seymour, but the exciting forward’s cross was blocked behind.

Niall Thompson, who’s really enjoying his football at the Cygnet Health Care Stadium since making the switch from rivals Tiverton, beat Will Henry to the ball on 23 minutes. His cross evaded all claret shirts, despite the goal being at Taunton’s mercy.

Fabulous footwork from Brain created space, and he found Moulden on 33 minutes, but the determined Bluebirds defence cleared another threatening ball into the box.

The goal came in rather calamitous fashion for the away side but to the delight of the Peacocks and supporters inside the Cygnet, a loose pass back to Will Henry was intercepted by Seymour, who rounded the keeper before calmly slotting home.

Manager Richard Luffman rang the changes early in the second half, and Seymour thought he had added his and the Peacocks’ second on 55 minutes when he ran through again. However, this time his dinked effort was just too high for Henry’s goal.

The away side continued to threaten, but Nick Grimes’ back four were more than happy to contain the Blues. The first real sign of danger came on 78 minutes when Tom Owen Evans beat the offside trap and slid a strike toward Phillips’ goal, but the young keeper got down low to smother the ball.

With just four minutes left on the clock, Chippenham thought they were level. Ezio Touray ran through and slotted the ball against the base of the right post. Phillips and Woodhouse then threw themselves in heroically to block and clear the danger.

Three minutes of injury time followed, but the Peacocks held on to keep their fifth clean sheet of the season and now look ahead to the Welsh Tour at the weekend, with trips to JD Cymru Premier sides Cardiff Metropolitan University FC and Penybont FC.