Goals in the gloaming

After the difficulty with last season's quarter final of the Liverpool Senior Cup, it was a relief to play this year's corresponding fixture against AFC Liverpool at the first attempt. Not that we were sure it would go ahead: it had rained heavily at the weekend, the drizzle in the afternoon was heavier than forecast, and we were advised to keep our tickets in case a late downpour prevented our starting. We were concerned when one of the linesmen looked at the pitch and went to the referee as he was preparing to kick off, but his issue was with the state of his station at the side, which was resolved by the referee and linesmen swapping diagonals.

The drizzle was heavy enough to require me to cover the camera, which I have not had to do for a while, so I was all thumbs for the first few minutes.

Danny Flood

A competitive first half finished with no score, so we adjourned to the warm to discuss the proposals for an extra division at steps 3 and 4, which get a cautious welcome from these pages. I have not worked out whether the seven into four between steps 4 and 3 will continue the southward drift of the Northern Premier League. If implemented, it looks as though we will swap Yorkshire away trips for some decidedly rural journeys to Staffordshire.

In an evenly matched game, there are usually periods where one team has the most of play, the trick being to take full advantage. We did this in a ten minute spell, starting with a goal from James McCulloch on the hour. This coincided with my changing a battery, and was followed by a booking for celebrating with the crowd. Even the AFC Liverpool supporter next to me, who had a mainly partisan assessment of the referee's performance, felt compelled to denounce his jobsworthery. I had little more luck capturing the next two goals, from James Edgar and Dominic Reid, although I at least caught the celebration for the last.

Dominic Reid celebrates his goal

We were by now in weather best described as sideways drizzle (a northern thing, like fog, only wetter).

Bram Johnstone

Josh Dolling completed the scoring ten minutes from time.

Josh Dolling

With a good performance from the whole team, it was difficult to choose the Rogues and Rascals Barbershop man of the match (on which I always decline to offer an opinion), with the award going to Jordan Wynne.

Jordan Wynne

As a note to self - I must find a box to stand the Rogues and Rascals board on for the presentation, we have only a couple of players who are not too tall for it if we just stand it on a table. As a note to everyone else - Wynne does have an e, I asked him!

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen on the club website here, and on Google Photos here.

Final score: Prescot Cables 4 (McCulloch, Edgar, Reid, Dolling) AFC Liverpool 0.