- Railwaymen hit four in first league win
- Demetriou (2), Long and Nevitt on target
- Unbeaten start to season continues
Mickey Demetriou scored twice against his former club Newport County as Crewe Alexandra picked up their first league victory of the season.
The summer signing took his tally to three for the campaign with a couple of instinctive finishes at Mornflake Stadium.
Will Evans had cancelled out the centre-half’s opener and Harry Charsley got a late consolation for the Exiles.
But by then Christopher Long has fired home from the spot and Elliott Nevitt had opened his account for the club.
The result makes it nine league games unbeaten at home stretching back to March for The Railwaymen.
Now they will prepare for the visit of Walsall this weekend (Saturday, 3pm).
Boss Lee Bell switched to a 3-4-3 formation and made two changes which saw Nevitt replace Courtney Baker-Richardson and Ryan Cooney come in for the injured Conor Thomas.
Newport, fresh from a bumper 4-0 win at the weekend, wanted a penalty in the opening stages when Aaron Wildig went down in the area off the ball, but the referee waved appeals away.
And Crewe were ahead on eight minutes when the visitors failed to clear a vicious Jack Powell free-kick delivery and Demetriou was on hand to sweep home from close range.
But it was 1-1 in controversial circumstances on 21 minutes when the ball looped up in the air and Evans clattered keeper Harvey Davies as he bundled home. Again, referee Adam Herczeg was not interested in protestations.
Davies made some big saves as County pressed. He tipped over a Seb Palmer-Houlden header, blocked a Charsley strike and then collected a dangerous cross from the right.
In added time Cooney did superbly well to trick his way past a couple of defenders in the box but then overhit his cross and nobody could get on the end of it.
Crewe started the second half on the front foot and asked a number of questions of the Newport defence, which they were able to answer.
That was until the 57th minute when Joel Tabiner whipped in a dangerous free-kick from the right and Demetriou was again on hand to expertly steer home.
And on 66 minutes it was 3-1 when Nevitt was felled in the area and Long smashed home with great power from the spot.
Nevitt got his long-awaited goal when he carried the ball forward on an angle before curling deliciously into the far corner for 4-1.
But Newport pulled one back with quarter of an hour left when Charsley ran in behind the defence and blasted into the near top corner.
The Alex managed the rest of the game, including 10 minutes of injury time, professionally and calmly.
James Waite had a late chance for Newport but his header was straight into the gloves of Davies.
Crewe (3-4-3): Davies; Williams, Demetriou, Offord; Cooney, Powell (O’Riordan, 76), Tabiner, Adebisi; Tracey (Griffiths, 90+8), Nevitt (Holicek, 86), Long (Baker-Richardson, 86).
Subs not used: Booth, Lunt, Billington.
Booked: None.
Newport (4-3-3): Townsend; McLoughlan, Delaney, Jameson (Seberry, 42), Lewis; Charsley (Waite, 75), Bennett (Wood, 75), Morris; Evans, Wildig, Palmer-Houlden (Bondswell, 75).
Subs not used: Maxted, Paynes, Rai.
Booked: Bondswell, Bennett.
Referee: A Herczeg.
Attendance: 3,619 (215).
