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Saturday 29th January - Frickley Athletic 2-0 Blyth Spartans

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The Blues made it three League wins on the bounce as they once again moved out of the relegation places with a convincing victory in today's "six pointer" against Blyth Spartans. In the end the scoreline could have been much more impressive as the Blues also had a goal disallowed and struck the woodwork four times!

Gary Marrow was able to welcome Gary Ingham, Steve Kennedy, Wael Nazha and Andy Evans into the starting line-up along with Matt Daly who passed a late fitness test.

After an even first few minutes the Blues started to make inroads into the Blyth defence. After forcing a couple of corners which came to nothing Leroy Chambers headed Lee Pugh's deep cross down for the onrushing Neil Ashley but a Blyth defender did enough to distract him as Ashley drilled his 16 yard shot wide of the left hand post. The Blues then forced another corner and this time Ashley's flag-kick was blasted against the crossbar by Chambers from 10 yards. Ingham was called into action for the first time after 15 minutes as he made a routine save from Scott Bell's weak 20 yard shot whilst at the other end Nazha saw his 20 yard snap-shot clear the crossbar. Chambers headed over from another Ashley corner before the Blues forced two corners in quick succession. From the second of these CHAMBERS stooped to head the ball into the net through a crowd of players from 5 yards to open the scoring. A minute later Ken Shoulder went close to equalising when he did well to keep control of a high bouncing ball in the box before turning and shooting over the bar from 15 yards. Within seconds the Blues earned a throw-in down the right, some 15 yards from the corner flag. Steve Robinson launched his traditional long throw towards Andy Evans who was unceremoniously pushed in the back by Peter Snowdon with the referee immediately awarding a penalty. NAZHA stepped up to confidently score from the spot with 25 minutes gone. Pugh then put a free-kick wide after Ashley had cynically been brought down just outside the box whilst :Pugh and Chambers combined for the latter to play the ball into the path of the onrushing Robinson but his low angled 20 yard shot hit the outside of the left hand post with Turns well beaten. 

The visitors made a change at half time, replacing Martin Peace with Chris Laws but they almost found themselves further behind within five minutes of the restart when Turns' clearance struck Chambers but, thankfully for Turns, the ball ricocheted out to the right of the penalty area. An angled volley that flew wide of the right hand post from a Blyth player was the nearest Blyth came to testing Ingham before the Blues struck the crossbar again. This time Evans met Selby's corner with a deft header that came back off the face of the crossbar. On 73 minutes Steve Woolford played a high ball forward that Chambers and Michael Laws both jumped for as Turns also came to try to collect it but the ball squirmed away from Turns for Chambers to tap into an empty net only for the goal to be ruled out for an alleged foul on Turns. Ashley then fired wide from 15 yards as Blyth failed to deal with another long throw from Robinson. Ingham was then forced to react quickly to collect a header from Bell following a Blyth free-kick before the Blues hit the woodwork for the fourth time. Pugh broke down the centre before releasing Evans down the left who looked up and picked out substitute Richard Tracey at the far post but his angled right foot volley came back off the far post and flew out to safety.