Marske United 4, Newton Aycliffe 0
By Bob Wood
If a week is a long time in politics, then four days is a lifetime in the Ebac Northern League.
Having put Marske United out of the League Cup last Tuesday evening, Saturday found Newton Aycliffe visiting the same opponents.
This time the prize was the three points on offer for a league game and Marske put in a strong performance to take the win.
Marske lie fourth in the league and with this win they find themselves five points behind leaders West Auckland but with three games in hand.
Aycliffe began this game in much the same positive fashion that they finished the cup match. As in that game they had the ball in the net in the first ten minutes. This time, however, the goal was ruled out for offside. A couple of minutes later a 20 yard shot from Paul Garthwaite had Markse keeper Robert Dean leaping to his left making an excellent save.
Markse responded to the early pressure well and the first goal came after 28 minsutes. A free-kick by Craig Gott from just outside the box took a heavy deflection and found its way past James Winter and into the Aycliffe net.
Within a few minutes Aycliffe’s misery was compounded when Ashley Coffey limped off with a hamstring injury.
Marske began to dominate and a second goal might have come on 36 minutes but for a fine save by Winter after an impressive move from the home attack.
The second half didn’t start well for Aycliffe and after 51 minutes a rare mistake from Winter saw a weak clearance fall to Park who was able to return the ball past the unfortunate keeper.
Aycliffe could have got themselves back in the game five minutes later when Dennis Knight missed a good chance.
With half an hour to go Brunskill scored Marske’s third. The fourth came with twenty minutes to go from ex Aycliffe player Jamie Owens who had an impressive game throughout.
At the start of the week Aycliffe fans would have taken one win out of the two fixtures against Marske but those making the trip to the Cleveland coast had high hopes of more.
In the end it wasn’t to be. All attention now turns to the next three league games which are all against teams in the lower half of the table.
FIXTURES
Sat 31st Jan: Sunderland RCA (H) 3pm
Sat 7th Feb: Penrith (A) 3pm
Sat 14th Feb: Celtic Nation (H) 3pm
