Town's inexperienced Reserve side were heavily beaten by their strong West Bromwich Albion counterparts at the Hawthorns this evening.

Danny Schofield's well-taken goal after 36 minutes made the score 2-1 at the time and the Terriers almost pulled level through a Joe Skarz volley at that point, but the Baggies - led by striker Scottish Craig Beattie, who grabbed a brace - went on to win by a convincing margin.

Former Darlington defender Shelton Martis opened the scoring after ten minutes before Sebastien Lake-Gaskin doubled the lead fifteen minutes later. Schofield netted his first second-string goal of the season with nine minutes of the first-half remaining, but Joss Labadie and Craig Beattie scored two goals in three minutes to make the score 4-1 at the interval.

Bartosz Slusarski scored his side's fifth goal two minutes after the restart before Town enjoyed their best spell of the game. Striker Lucas Akins had two efforts on goal around the hour mark; directing a right-wing cross from Mitchell Bailey inches wide of goal before forcing the home goalkeeper into a decent save with a deflected cross just a minute later. However, it was Beattie who completed the scoring - scoring his second of the game with seven minutes left.

Matty Young's late strike went over the top of the crossbar in the last meaningful action of the game and despite the defeat Reserve team manager John Dungworth told htafc.com that he was pleased with the attitude of his side.

"The result was pretty much sealed going into the second-half, but the lads must take some credit for never giving up," John explained. "We can take positives from our performance; Aaron Hardy was probably our best player on the evening at centre-back, Danny Racchi put some good crosses from the right side and Danny Schofield took his goal well. Joe Skarz showed well in central midfield too."

Town's Team vs. WBA Reserves:

Simon Eastwood, Danny Racchi, Tom Jackson, Joe Skarz, Aaron Hardy (c), Daniel Codman, Luke Malcher, Matthew Young, Lucas Akins, Mitchell Bailey, Danny Schofield

Unused Subs: Stephen Brook, Lewis Collinson, Leigh Franks, Spencer Harris, Jack Hunt