Central Midlands League North, Floodlit Cup, 1st Round
Harworth Colliery Institute (1) 3
Chris Belshaw 23
Craig Anderson 50
Tom Walker 57
Yorkshire Main (0) 1
Mark Carter 75
Admission £3, Programme £1, Badges £3 each
Thanks to Rob Dawson for the cake supplies
Just before kick off, I saw a doting, very sensible, attractive and young looking mum, telling her son to get his coat on, or he'd get his death of cold on a night like this.
Ah bless!
I'm sure that if the rest of his team mates on the bench had seen it, they would rib him mercilessly ... but don't worry Scott Hardman, your secret is safe with me ;-)
It was evident early in the game that it was going to be a hard slog and heavy going in such strength sapping conditions for both teams.
Lloyd Wilkinson, making a rare first team appearance had an outstanding game and it was from his measured cross on 23 minutes that Chris Belshaw broke the deadlock and put Harworth ahead.
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A few heavy challenges had to be nipped in the bud by the referee Mr M Kiecz, who asserted his authority well and stamped out any rash challenges, before they got out of hand and somebody got hurt on slippery surface.
The referee deserved a lot of credit, for defusing a string of borderline reckless challenges early in the game.
I'm not going to point the finger of blame anywhere, but Lloyd Wilkinson, who was being man marked by Gareth Dawson, was subject to a bit of a battering at times.
Before the break, a great ball down the left flank from Chris Belshaw, sent Tom Padgett tearing into the visitors box, where he took the unselfish option and spread the ball across to the right hand side of the area, to where Gaz Sides was only a whisker away from doubling Harworth's advantage.
HT - Harworth CI 1 v Yorkshire Main 0
Tom Walker curled a great free kick to Craig Anderson, who turned the ball home from close range.
Seven minutes later, Walker claimed a goal for himself, when he scored with a sublime finish from 20 yards out that went in off the left hand upright.
Some might say it was a cross cum shot that went in, but Tom told me afterwards that he meant to score, so that'll do for me ;-)
Just after the hour, Walker tried his luck again with a free kick from a similar range, which crashed off the crossbar, with Aaron Kamara, the visitors goalkeeper well beaten.
Paul Burns nearly extended Harworth's lead, but Kamara pulled off a great save to deny him.
In the 75th minute, Main pulled a goal back, when Mark Carter's deflected shot from outside the area, wrong footed Mark Latham and ended up in the back of the net.
Mohamed Sabah, broke through into the left hand side of Colliery's box inside the last minute, but couldn't keep his shot down or on target ... and any short lived notions the visitors might have had about forcing the game into extra time fizzled out.
In the end, it was a fairly straight forward eighth win in a row for Harworth, who grafted well as a team to overcome the difficult playing conditions and weather on the night.
Tom Walker's not inconsiderable contribution had a telling influence on the result.
But, for his non stop work rate and resilience when he was being singled out for a fair bit of 'solid' attention, I'm giving the man of the match honours to Lloyd Wilkinson, who wholly justified his selection tonight.
FT - Harworth CI 3 v Yorkshire Main 1
