Handsworth Parramore 4 v Knaresborough Town 2 - NCEL LC R4

Thursday 5th April 2018
Toolstation NCEL League Cup 4th Round 
at Sandy Lane
Handsworth Parramore (2) 4
James Ashmore 40, Courey Grantham 43
Oscar Radford 53, Jordan Turner 84
Knaresborough Town (2) 2
Nicholas Black 22, Daniel Clayton 35
Admission £5. Programme £1.50
Attendance 89

Thursday night football (which is starting to become the norm around these parts) provided me with an excellent opportunity to get down and watch two teams in action, who have been on my radar no end of times recently, only for the weather, or my commitments elsewhere, to scupper those plans, often at the eleventh hour.
I'm happy to report that it's been worth the wait, because neither side failed to live up to my expectations, and between them they delivered an excellent game of football, that was enjoyed by committed fans and neutrals alike... including the handful of Worksop Town fans who were present.
If results go their way, Knaresborough can clinch promotion to the NCEL Premier Division at the weekend, when they take on second placed Eccleshill United at Manse Lane... and on this showing they'll soon adapt to the higher level of football.

Tonight, Paul Stansfield's side adopted a system whereby they dropped deep to absorb pressure from their hosts, to thwart their attacking intentions,before hitting them at pace, on the break, which worked really well... up to a point.
The first goal scoring opportunity fell to Knaresborough, when the Ambers keeper James Leverton was left exposed as he raced from his line in an attempt to make a clearance, with Nick Black homing in, chasing after the same 50/50 ball... the visitors striker reached it a fraction before him, but his chip over Leverton was cleared, virtually off the line, by Lee Cooksey.
The workaholic Cooksey was also involved in the action at the other end of the pitch almost immediately after his clearance, but his header from James Ashmore's delivery flew just past the wrong side of the post.

Dan Clayton received the ball on the edge of the Handsworth area with his back to goal and did well to get a shot away on the turn, that dipped wide of the left hand upright.
Cooksey slotted a measured ball into the path of Courey Grantham, whose momentum and a quick burst of pace took him deep into Knaresborough territory, but as he found himself in space through the right channel, his shot across the face of the goal skidded just wide of the left hand post.
Jack Rushworth got his angles right and cut out a low cross from Jordan Turner from the right hand side of the area, and moments later got down well to his left to push Josh Hemingway's long range shot away at the expense of a corner.

Clayton collided with Ozzy Radford, just inside the Ambers half of the field and played the ball forward (as the Handsworth captain went to ground), to where Black picked up possession and tore away towards the hosts area, with Stuart Ludlam, Will Eades and Leverton between him and the goal;
he skipped over the former's challenge before slightly wrong footing the other two momentarily, by feigning to shoot, before planting the ball into the bottom corner of the net.

The hosts management team, felt that the coming together of Clayton and Radford.in the build up to the opening goal constituted a foul.
But I didn't... and nor did the referee! Just saying Jasper ;-)
Ludlam, Grantham and Jed Phillips all had chances to draw Handsworth level, with James Ashmore supplying a decent range of crosses into the area, but the visitors defence were still proving to be a tough nut to crack; meanwhile, Leverton let a cross from Clayton slip from his grasp after Ben Cohen had been allowed a free forty yard run through the Parras half before playing the ball out wide to Clayton, but Radford was close by, covering his keeper and he rescued the situation.

The visitors scored a second in the 35th minute, when Clayton took a sideways pass from Black to his right, on the edge of the area, and toe-punted a dipping shot over the advancing Leverton into the right hand corner of his unguarded net.

If only Knaresborough could've held onto their lead until the interval, they might have been able to bolster their already hard working back-line during their half time team talk and hold on for a place in the next round of the League Cup. But Handsworth were having none of it, especially James Ashmore and the North Yorkshire side were rocked by two body blows inside the space of three minutes. 

In the first instance Jordan Turner crossed from out on the right flank to Grantham, who turned the ball into the path of Ashmore who struck a quality finish past Rushworth.

The Knaresborough keeper turned Grantham's shot on the turn round his left hand upright, but let Grantham glance the ball inside the same post from Ashmore's resulting corner kick.

Cohen almost regained the lead for Knaresborough on the stroke of half time, but his effort was cleared off the line amidst a goalmouth scramble.

HT: 2-2

The second half wasn't as open as the first had been, but the home side were good value for their win, given the way that they closed ranks and made good use of two of the further chances that they created.

Ashmore rolled the ball to Grantham with a quickly taken free kick and then took a return pass from the Ambers number nine, before picking out Cooksey, who was only denied a goal by a good stop by Rushworth, who got a hand to the ball at full stretch. 

There followed a spell of frantic activity in front of the Knaresborough six yard box, during which time Turner almost uprooted the right hand post with a ferocious strike, that had so much power behind it, that it rebounded for a throw in. The Ambers kept applying pressure and were rewarded eight minutes after the restart, when Ludlam's attempt on goal rebounded into the path of Radford, who applied the finishing in touch to give his side the lead.

Seventeen year old Tyler Bradley was introduced from the subs bench into the fray and didn't look even slightly out of place in the 100mph rough and tumble of a NCEL cup tie. It has to be said, the teams that Handsworth keep putting out containing members of their highly acclaimed and much envied youth set up, look younger ever day.

Rushworth pulled off another great stop, this time from Cooksey, and though the home side were seeing more and more off the ball, while there was still only one goal separating the two sides Knaresborough weren't going to give this one up without one hell of a fight.

It was always going to take something special to force the issue now and right on cue as the game entered the closing four minutes, Turner drilled home an unstoppable precision shot on the turn to all but put his side through into the quarter finals.

While the referee consulting his watch and signalled his assistants, Leverton saved from Harry Brown, and with that an enthralling game, between two sides who obviously wanted to win, regardless of the further fixture chaos another game (at least) would entail, came to a close.

FT: 4-2

Well played to both teams, we enjoyed that!

Good luck to Knaresborough on your impending last push for promotion... and to Handsworth in the next round of the cup as well.

This blog post is dedicated to the the two young Tigers fans (you know who you are) who kept shouting "Worksop reject!" at Jordan Turner all night. 

He took his goal well didn't he lads!?
Footnote: It was good to catch up with blogger/reporter Devon Cash tonight, you can view his thought's and observations about the game, by clicking this link: Prowler 2000