Report

Why do we do this?  - A suicidal defensive first 5 minutes – then an up hill battle!
 

1-0 down after 45 seconds and 2-0 down after 4 minutes – a sleepy County conceded 2 early goals due to sloppy defending leaving us a mountain to climb in the remaining 76 minutes.
 

We discussed at length pre-match that the Moorside right flank needed close attention early on as the pace of no.6 Luke Liddy (Aged 13! – we should sign him) and no.2 Josh Temple had caused us no end of bother at their place – and within 6 minutes they had both raided us twice and left us 2-0 down with Kieran Brown and Josh Perry grabbing the early goals for Moorside.

 

This was a really disappointing start but following this County did well to try to recover the game.

 

After 6 minutes County did really well and had many chances with Daniel Knowd feeding Mark Jacomb on 8 minutes but his chance went narrowly past the post.

On 11 minutes Kieran Hurton attacked a well-floated corner from the left and his effort hit the post and was cleared to safety by Moorside.

On 21 minutes Macauley Ashton went close after a neat dribble and fine shot making the keeper tip the ball past the post.

Mark Jacomb then went close on 25 minutes and he shot wide of the post with a fine effort.

Just prior to the interval Joseph Russell had a great chance but his right-footed effort went inches wide of the Moorside post.

Moorside only had one other real chance and an effort on goal was headed over the bar by skipper Aiden Brown.

In the second half County didn’t create as many chances but it was a well fought out game and with injuries to Kieran Hurton and Sean Mearman it required a lot of defensive action from both Macauley Ashton and Daniel Knowd with both boys spending more time in their own box than on the offensive.

County had a few corners in the second period and attacked them more effectively with Kieran Hurton heading over and then also having a good chance in the latter stages and lobbing over the bar.

Aaron Clasper made his debut for County and despite not having many chances he showed that his offensive tenacity will serve County well as he chases every ball and give us some renewed offensive energy.

Overall – I think that Moorside deserved the victory as they were out of the blocks very quickly when we were still sleepy.

Man of the Match was awarded to Daniel Knowd for sticking to his assigned task and endless energy up and down the flanks without giving up on both flanks – not pretty but effective nevertheless.

On a positive note this now leaves us with a free weekend next Sunday as we would have been due to play Seaham in the Cup but with injuries and some boys watching the Mags/Mackems match we would have been short of players in any case due to our small squad size.

The best news we have received this week is that Daniel Hopkinson has spoken for the first time since his accident and brain surgery – so we can hopefully see him back on the pitch in the near future.

And finally..... it was great to see Bomber at the match having head butted a bench in a graveyard and ending up with 7 staples in his head!  - he had a stormer last week and should be back on a pitch near you shortly - the bench is still in intensive care but should recover! 


Well done everybody!