Blyth Spartans 3 Southport 3 . Match report

An action packed and thoroughly entertaining game ended in a 3-3 draw at Croft Park last night.

Nine yellow cards, three penalties and six goals with chances aplenty for both sides on a heavy pitch made for a good night’s entertainment.

Blyth opened the scoring with the first of the penalties which was awarded for a push by Renshaw in the box from a corner. 1-0

Southport responded within 90 seconds with Jack Bainbridge firing home from a corner.

The lively home side then had a very impressive period of play and ratled in two more goals to go in to the break 3-1 to the good but you got a feeling there would be more goals as we were actually playing some good football going forward and teh next goal was going to be crucial.

Brad Holmes on as a sub for Luke Burgess duly obliged in the 50th minute and we were back in it at 3-2.

Chances were flowing at either end but the referee’s assistant took centre stage awarding a very harsh penalty for an alleged handball. This time Blyth missed and it stayed at 3-2.

Time for the referee to be involved once again awarding us a penalty which also looked to be harsh as had all three if we are honest. Josh Hmami stepped up to take it and the ‘keeper made a fine save but the ball broke free and Niall watson was on hand to fire home to make it 3-3.

A breathless finish saw Jack Doyle go close to snatching an unlikely winner but Blyth had three chances in a goalmouth scramble that saw some excellent defending and goalkeeping by Renshaw.

Line Up: Renshaw, Thomson, Doyle, Flowers, Quansah, Bainbridge, Burgess(Holmes), Morgan, Bennett(Watson) Carver(O’Neill) Hmami

Unused Subs: Evans & McMillan

Attendance 435

Media Man Of The Match: Jack Bainbridge