Bacup Borough went into this game without current leading goal scorer Tony Carroll and Experienced Centre Back Captain Ian Hughes both added to an ever continuing list of injured players and after twenty minutes into the game Danny Hartley had to be replaced with ligament damage, however none of this had any adverse effect on the team’s performance.
The home side started sharply and bright in the opening minutes and Paul Horridge produced two excellent saves to prevent Squires Gate getting off to an ideal start. For the first ten minutes Bacup were slow to get into the game but from the eleventh minute once everyone had settled down it was the visitors that were stamping their authority on the game, winning their personal battles and producing some quality football which just required the finishing touch of a goal. This almost came Bacup’s way when John Borgs shot was dipping over the head of the Squires Gate keeper but agonisingly dropped onto the top of the net, apart from a slow start the visitors could be pleased with their first half contribution in a game that was played at a quick tempo and highly contested.
The second half got under way, in contrast to the early stages of the first half it was Bacup that created the openings, Bryan Herbert had a great opportunity to shoot the visitors in front but failed to connect with the ball properly and an opportunity missed, the Bacup players were all working hard all over the pitch winning second balls and building play up well which resulted in another chance when Davey Lukers goal bound shot was deflected away much to the frustration of Borough. Even more frustrating was when captain for the evening Stuart Shepherd almost on the goal line received a brilliant last ditch challenge preventing Bacup a certain goal. Bacup were stepping up the pace and could sense a goal was on the horizon, which almost came when Bryan Herbert was clean through and really he should have done better and made the keeper work harder than he had to do.
The home side were not in the game in the second half apart from the last ten minutes when they put Bacup under considerable pressure which resulting in a series of corners. The pressure was invited onto the Bacup defence when Dean Brown surprisingly gave the ball away, thankfully the defence stood strong and Bacup got a well deserved point and with a clinical finisher they would have come away with all three and there could not have been any complaints from the home side.
Manager Brent Peters Comments "I could not praise the lads enough as a team, they all showed a true grit, determined performance with the will to win. I had criticised the team previously for not putting in a shift and looking like they were not hungry enough for success, well such was a contrast in this game, every single player worked hard, wanting the bal, producing at times some quality football. Credit also must go to Squires Gate, they also tried to play football which made the game an entertaining nil-nil draw., My lads were hurting after the match because they knew with the chances created it should have been a very good away win, whilst hurting is a good sign, I told them to take heart from that performance and take that into our next game. Standards must not drop, taking one point at Squires Gate is always a good point and, also keeping a clean sheet against them is pleasing because if allowed they are a side capable of scoring plenty of goals which they have shown in previous game. From my point of view I took a lot of positives out of this game I just hope we don’t drop standards in our next match and we must build on this and our away win at St Helens, one win and one draw in two away league matches is good. "
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