Pickering Town 1 Runcorn Linnets 4

NPL NW side Pickering Town.

The only change to the team that ‘battered’ Kendal 3-2 a week earlier was the return of Paddy Wharton in goal.

A substantial 4-1 victory would have been a representative outcome for Runcorn’s domination in the Lakes, and the same was true on Saturday, with the travellers in orange taking rapid control of possession

and mounting wave after wave of attacks from the start.

Pickering didn’t defend with the

admirable fortitude that Kendal had done.

But the comfortable final outcome doesn’t really tell the story.

A 2-0 half-time lead, which could have

been at least doubled, against ten men looked like a job almost done.

But there were less than ten minutes

remaining when Iwan Murray cemented a phenomenal performance by restoring the two-goal margin, before he put the tin lid on his man-of-the- match status by scoring again with almost the last touch of the game.

Iwan’s route one rampages into the home penalty area were like watching Groundhog Day on fast forward, and if three-quarters of them hadn’t ended via the Pickering tactic of taking out the man and hoping to get enough of the ball to satisfy the referee, he would surely have scored six.

Linnets started as they had played for 90 minutes at Kendal, on the rapid offensive.

Stuart Crilly beat his marker for the first of many occasions to pull back a great cross that was headed out for a corner before it reached Ryan Brooke.

Then a James Short cross from the left found Murray outside the far post, from where he skewed his attempt.

A wag behind the goal shouted “The net’s over there, mate”. I assured him that Iwan

knew where it was, and would soon prove it.

In the early stages, two or three long-ball Pickering assaults from frantic clearances were swallowed up with composure by O’Mahony, Downes and Hayes in the middle of the pitch, big centre-forward Harry Jessop the apparent linchpin of Town’s game plan.

Lindfield fed Downes, who pulled it back for a Jacques Welsh shot which curled wide.

On 16 minutes Crilly advanced into the area wide right, and with a cross awaited, he tried a surprise shot which Charlie Andrew did well to cover in time.

Runcorn possession was almost continuous, interrupted only by niggly fouls leading to more Linnets

attacks. One led to a Lindfield shot from distance, which was blocked, but Crilly picked up the loose ball inside the penalty area, took two steps and lashed a shot which Andrew got a glove to but

couldn’t keep out.

Linnets were ahead from what I counted as their tenth attempt in the first 17 minutes, and we were still two minutes from Pickering’s first.

That came when O’Mahony delayed Jessop’s solo run long enough for Wharton to come off his line to block the No9’s shot at close range.

Pickering were being allowed a spell of possession at last, but it lacked a threatening touch.

Adam Barthram joined the fray, when Runcorn left back Short departed due to injury.

Linnets were on the move again, Hayes and Welsh repeatedly winning the ball in midfield to start attacking moves.

With ten minutes of the half remaining, a triangular passing move started by Lindfield on the left set Iwan Murray on a run into the area, nipping between two defenders and advancing on the ’keeper.

Right-back Jack Johnson tripped him from behind, and with no other line of defence to challenge Murray, Mr Hall delivered the double blow of a penalty and a red card for Johnson.

Lindfield made no mistake from the spot, and a passage to the first round proper was beginning to look like a formality.

The visitors looked confidently in control, and more goals seemed likely, the

Pickering response chiefly that of going to ground in two-footed tackles.

That pattern ultimately earned them six yellow cards to go with Johnson’s red.

With half-time looming, Murray was in the area again, chipping the advancing Andrew only to see the ball come back off the bar. Iwan met it again, but scrambled his

attempt wide.

A moment later, the bar was troubled again, rattled firmly by an O’Mahony header from Crilly’s cross.The game should have been over as a contest, but less than a minute into the second period the lead

was halved.

Linnets got bodies forward again from the off, leaving space for Jessop to gallop

goalwards, chasing a long clearance.

Downes thought better of tripping him and levelling up the numbers, and Paddy Wharton could do nothing to prevent the ball finding the left corner of the net.

Another minute later, the scores were almost levelled, after an identical chance. But Jessop miscontrolled and O’Mahony was able to intervene.

Pickering would continue to address their visitors’ superiority on the ball by leaving Jessop upfront and launching howitzers up to him whenever they got hold of it.

For Linnets, it was business as usual,

getting forward in numbers via passing moves across the width of the pitch and out to the flanks, particularly involving Crilly on the right.

His balance and footwork necessitated two men on him at all times, and fouls continued to be Town’s main response to the problem of Runcorn possession.

With the hour mark nearing, Murray was on a straight line charge into the area yet again, and was sent sprawling from directly behind, in my view a far more cut and dried foul than the one that earned red for Johnson.

The referee, who was 20 yards behind the incident, signalled that the ball had been won. Surely a legal impossibility, if

not a physical one.

Apart from one Pickering corner, headed clear by O’Mahony, the hosts had faced relentless Linnets pressure for more than ten minutes.

Brown and Barthram put in cross after cross, with Brooke, Lindfield, Welsh, Murray and O’Mahony all striving to connect. And Barthram opted for shots from outside the area as well, three wide but

close enough to elicit ‘oohs’. It was a siege.

And yet it was still 2-1, with Town having been a man short for well over half an hour. Each time a Pickering defender launched a long one towards the distant Jessop, the small enclave of Linnets officials present - away supporters not being admitted by the home club due to Runcorn's Tier 3 Covid status - began to fear an unlikely penalty shoot-out, or even worse.

Welsh gave way to Tom McCready, who had been missing since he was injured in the win over Tadcaster.

There were 15 minutes to go when Pickering mounted their first concerted forward possession of the half, four passes resulting in as many shots, all blocked at close range by Runcorn heads and boots.

No clear chance emerged, but the tie definitely wasn’t over.

Linnets were beginning to seek out the clincher with longer balls from deep, which seemed more likely to provide Pickering with long-ball escape routes, perhaps unwise when Runcorn had proved so

adept at keeping possession all afternoon?

Shows how much I know. One such ball up the right for Murray was picked up by Soni Fergus. He hadn’t learned from an

earlier backpass, which had almost opened the door for Crilly, and rolled it back to his ’keeper once more.

It bobbled and slowed on the deteriorating pitch, unlike Iwan Murray. He got there first, rounded Andrew and slotted it home. It was 3-1 at last.

Ben Wharton looked as keen as mustard to add to the margin of comfort, chasing in from the right and shaping to shoot, with Turnbull and Clappison all over him. As Ben tried again, Fergus flattened

him inside the penalty arc to spark angry reactions from the Runcorn sub.

Craig Lindfield was to slam the free-kick into the left upright.

Murray and Lindfield saw attempts blocked by bodies in blue.

But deep into added time, Murray closed in on goal for what seemed like the hundredth time, with Pickering sub Leon Osborne the latest to make contact from behind.

But Mr Hall didn't need to consider giving a long-overdue second penalty this time, as Murray kept his cool to slot home his third goal in two games, and his team’s fourth of the tie.

The stats would show an emphatic 4-1 Runcorn victory, and that was the very least their domination of the game warranted.

But for 35 second-half minutes, their place in the next round was far from assured.

Credit to Pickering for never giving up from 2-0 down with ten men, but given a stricter

referee, their modus operandi would surely have led to their numerical disadvantage being further widened.

Runcorn Linnets: Paddy Wharton, Ally Brown, James Short (Adam Barthram 30), Louis Hayes, Sean

O’Mahony, Alex Downes, Stuart Crilly, Jacques Welsh (Tom McCready 71), Ryan Brooke (Ben

Wharton 79), Iwan Murray, Craig Lindfield. Subs not used: Scott Lycett, Carl Spellman.

Attendance: 166.