Mid-season friendly: Leyton Orient 1 Greenwich Borough 0

A Lamar Reynolds goal helped a Leyton Orient XI defeat Greenwich Borough 1-0 last night in a friendly at Harlow Town.

The Bostik Premier club allowed the O’s to use their Harlow Arena artificial surface to give some of their fringe players’ much-needed minutes.

It proved to be a worthwhile exercise for Justin Edinburgh and his coaching staff on a cold night in Essex.

Charlie Grainger was given a run-out in goal while recent recruits Marvin Ekpiteta and Nathan Mavila also started.

Myles Judd, Dan Happe, Jake Caprice, Reynolds and David Mooney played and so did the highly-rated Charles Clayden.

Newport County loanee Reynolds had the first effort of note in the 22nd minute, but he drilled wide of the post.

It was the only genuine opportunity of the opening 45 minutes as it ended goalless at the break.

Reynolds was looking lively and tested the Greenwich Borough goalkeeper four minutes into the second half with a long-range effort.

Four minutes later and Clayden, who had now moved out to the left, beat his marker and crossed in for Reynolds, but the attacker couldn’t get a telling touch.

Less than 60 seconds later and Orient did take the lead and it was no surprise who opened the scoring either.

Mooney played a clever through ball for Reynolds and the ex-Barking youngster poked home to score his first goal for the club.

It should have been 2-0 with 58 minutes on the clock when Clayden picked out Happe from a corner, but the centre back headed over.

Greenwich threatened six minutes later, but Grainger wasn’t called into action as the shot from distance went wide.

Orient thought they had doubled their advantage with 13 minutes left when substitute Christian Scales’ cross was converted by Reynolds, but the loanee was judged to be in an offside position.

Clayden then went close to making it 2-0 when he dribbled past several Borough rivals before firing a shot against the crossbar with 81 played.

There was still time for Greenwich to threaten late on, but a low effort rolled wide of the post and it finished 1-0.

Borough boss Paul Barnes said: “Thank you to Danny (Webb) and everyone else at Leyton Orient. It was a great benefit to us and a big thank you to Harlow Town for hosting.”

Leyton Orient XI: Grainger; Judd (Trialist 61), Ekpiteta, Happe, Mavila; Caprice (Scales 70), Haxiu, Kyprianou, Reynolds; Clayden; Mooney (Benyoucef 70).

Unused substitutes: Janata.