Grimsby Town end EFL Trophy campaign with defeat at Chesterfield

Grimsby Town’s EFL Trophy campaign ended with a 3-2 defeat away at Chesterfield, with long-awaited injury returns made by key players.

In a dead-rubber group game, the Mariners played out an entertaining contest with Chesterfield, who secured the top spot in the group with the win. The big positive for Town was the players who featured on the night.

David Artell gave full professional debuts to centre-back Callum Storr and midfielder Henry Brown, with the latter starting alongside the returning Curtis Thompson in the middle of the park.

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These were Thompson's first competitive minutes of the campaign, having made his long-awaited return from an injury suffered in pre-season. Wrexham loanee Jordan Davies also returned from a long-term absence as a substitute.

Before the game kicked off, the hosts had already qualified for the knockout rounds, and Town had already been eliminated, so there was not much in it for either team.

Chesterfield did take an early lead through James Berry, who drove through the centre of the pitch, finding enough space just outside the area to shoot, beating a diving Jordan Wright with a powerful effort that soared into the roof of the net.

Town found a response just ten minutes after the opener through Lewis Cass, who saw his cutback intercepted, but the ball came back to him to score the equaliser with his shot going in off the post.

It was a nice through ball from Jayden Luker to play Cass through on goal initially, with the former getting some much-needed minutes as he slowly builds his way into the team after a delayed start to his loan spell due to injury.

Thompson came off half an hour into the game in a pre-planned change. Artell wanted to ease the experienced midfielder back into action gently after a long period on the sidelines with injury. Harvey Cribb replaced Thompson for his first competitive involvement with the Mariners, having impressed Artell in the pre-season.

Justin Obikwu had a great chance to put Town ahead a couple of minutes after the change, going through one-on-one with the goalkeeper with Cameron Gardner there for support. The cutback was on, but Obikwu opted to shoot and was denied by the Chesterfield goalkeeper Ryan Boot.

Paddy Madden restored the home side’s lead six minutes before the interval with a classy finish, controlling a low cross past Wright and slotting into an empty net.

Town did not stay behind for long in the second half. Gardner finished a great team move well, with Obkiwu passing instead of shooting on this occasion after a quick transition move.

Chesterfield should have gone ahead for a third time in the game when Madden was presented with a chance just a few yards out from goal and missed, but he was on hand to set up Berry for his second and team’s third on the night just before the hour mark.

Davies came on for the final 20 minutes, his first action since August. His first action was to play Obikwu through, with the Grimsby striker fouled on the edge of the box, looking to get into a position to shoot.

The final 15 minutes of the game were fairly uneventful, with nothing of significance on the line for either team. The hosts saw out the win after an end-to-end battle.

Starting lineup: Wright; Cass, Storr (Warren 86’), Tharme, Carson; Thompson (Cribb 30’), Brown (Davies 69’), Ainley; Luker (Barrington 69’), Gardner, Obikwu

Unused subs: Auton, Svanthorsson, Rose