I could get used to these last minute goals

Prescot Cables' game at home to Bamber Bridge was a key fixture, with both clubs looking strong over the last few weeks. The winners would take the driving seat to claim fourth place. With extra promotion places due to league reorganisation - second place automatically, and third for the team with the best points per game over the six step four divisions - this would guarantee a home playoff semi final, and if Hyde and Scarborough continued their run of form, a home final should we reach it.

Word had got around, and it was a pleasant evening, so we saw a crowd of 325, which a couple of years ago we would have considered one of the best for a Saturday, and unachievable in midweek.

The visitors' bench once again seemed intent on getting in a picture.

The first half was more or less in daylight, with light as intense as the average winter afternoon and of better quality.

These pages promote the value of keeping your shoes polished, so I could not fail to be impressed by Bamber Bridge manager Neil Reynolds' immaculate brogues - just visible here behind Reece McNally - and that he kept them clean on ground still damp from recent weather.

It is at evening games that the hardy denizens of the Gasworks Side come into their own.

Valter Fernandes

Chris Almond opened the scoring after 15 minutes. It is not the best of pictures, but a goal is a goal ...

... and a celebration is a celebration.

It would always be difficult to keep the visitors at bay, although we still had the lead at half time. The team seemed to be tiring in the second half, and Bamber Bridge took advantage about 15 minutes in. Fresh legs were needed, and supplied by Harry Cain and Josh Klein-Davies.

Harry Cain

Josh Klein-Davies

The latter was also to supply the all important winning goal. With the clock running down, and its looking as though we would share a point and the visitors maintain their advantage in the race for fourth place, Josh took a shot that had a slightly lucky deflection into the net.

Scenes, as we are becoming accustomed to reporting, ensued - Ben Barnes once again demonstrating an impressive turn of speed to join the celebrations.

To be fair, the result was harsh on Bamber Bridge, with a draw more closely reflecting play, but we have fallen to enough last minute goals in the past - there were seasons we would have been a few places higher in the table if games were 80 minutes not 90 - we enjoy them when the luck falls in our favour.

Board member Jamie Weston was wearing a tie (I assume the league sponsors have relaxed their insistence on one for board room admission, as no-one else was), so was pressed into presenting a bumper crop of awards. Valter Fernandes' Man of the Match from the Mossley game was running late (!), and Baba Conteh picked up a double of Man of the Match for this game and Player of the Month for March.

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 2 (Almond, Klein-Davies) Bamber Bridge 1.

An actual warm day

The day of Prescot Cables' game at home to Mossley at the weekend was one of those spring days when you choose your clothes in the morning, thinking you need a coat, to find by early afternoon that you could really do without it. Now all I need is a couple of properly warm days to re-wax it: it missed out last year as, by the time I realised it was warm enough for the wax to soak into the cloth, it no longer was.

The day's mascot was Alfie Lund, a regular attender at games across the league and beyond, and one of only about 120 children in the world with MECP2 duplication syndrome. My attempt to take a presentation picture with the starting lineup was thwarted by Alfie being literally the only person looking in the right direction.

Once you have a high vis and a big camera, you get random photo requests, which is all very well, but I wonder where to publish them. This week's request came from the Mossley bench.

At least when our own supporters are giving me a cheery wave, I know they want to be included in the collection.

With the bright light, for the first half I mainly stayed in shutter priority and managed my own speeds, keeping the aperture as open as possible, making for a nice soft focus background.

Lloyd Dean 1/1250s, f/4.3, ISO125

We have started well in the last few games I have seen, but it was not to be on this occasion, with a fairly disjointed performance.

Our secretary team were keeping a sharp eye out for anything untoward.

Matty Roberts (Assistant Secretary) & Dan Roberts (Club Secretary)

There was a rumour that the visitors were particularly affected by their fixture backlog and concerned they were likely to tire after 60 minutes. In this situation you can do worse than build a lead and hope to hang on to it. The tactic seemed to be working with Mossley 2-0 up at half time.

In the second half, the Gasworks Side was providing pictures for a few family albums.

Mr Graham Edgar watches James

We were playing much better in this half, although it started to look as though we would not find the net, until Harry Cain got through with a couple of minutes to go.

Harry Cain shoots for goal ...

Celebrations were brief: goal difference is all very well, but not much use without the points to get you in position to benefit from it.

... and gets back for the restart

Chris Almond secured the result with seconds to go.

Chris Almond

Scenes ensued.

These were scenes that involve beer being abandoned in an upwards direction. Fortunately I was nowhere near where it came back to earth.

Steve Pilling collects the empties from the goal celebrations

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 2 (Cain, Almond) Mossley 2

Greyscale

When I was about ten I attended a children's exhibition at Alexandra Palace in London. At one stall you could make your own abstract painting, squeezing some paint on to paper that was spun on a turntable and came out with abstract patterns. I have never had strong fingers, and was concerned I had not applied much paint, but it came out well, with distinct blocks of colour, whereas other children, who had used much more paint, ended up with it all merging into a monochrome blob.

I wondered whether the designer of Kendal Town's kit for their visit to Prescot Cables used a similar process, putting the black and white of their home kit on the turntable and ending up with mid grey. They had a thought for those wearing replica shirts walking or cycling on rural roads by including fluorescent numbers and advertising, ensuring they were visible at night.

Sam Staunton-Turner

I had missed a couple of games, Easter commitments meaning I was unable to travel to South Shields, and the weather enforced change of date at Colwyn Bay clashing with other arrangements. I wondered whether we might need to squeeze this fixture into a rapidly closing window, as it had rained heavily in the morning. A declared crowd of 146 suggested many people came to the same conclusion and stayed indoors to watch Liverpool in European action, and the number who looked to be present suggested that included a few season ticket holders. However, whilst the area around the tunnel was predictably soft, the Gasworks Side was surprisingly firm. The linesmen were on the opposite sides to the usual arrangement: I thought his might be because of the weather, but I think the referee, Mr Buxton, may just prefer that arrangement.

We had matching goalkeepers, which strictly speaking you are not supposed to, but I have never seen both get close enough, even when one goes up for a last minute corner, to make it an issue.

Ben Barnes

Matthew Johnson

Given that, whilst were still in some sort of daylight, the colour of the sky matched the visitors' kit without the bright bits, I knew the light would play havoc with my exposures. There is not much you cannot fix, but it means processing all the images, including the raw conversion, manually.

Reece McNally

This was my first opportunity to see recent signing Morgan Homson-Smith in action.

Morgan Homson-Smith

I occasionally practice rolling into a ball if it looks as though I am about to be between a player and the pitch perimeter, mainly to protect the camera, but also to make sure the player does not collide at full speed with a protruding piece of hard plastic. I thought for a moment I might need to put it into action.

Harry Cain

MJ Monaghan added to the tally of goals he has scored since joining us a few weeks ago.

MJ Monaghan avoids the defender ...

... and the goalkeeper ...

... and celebrates his goal.

The light in the second half was easier to work with, being standard floodlights, and the underlying grey of Kendal's kit was more reflective than I was expecting.

James Edgar

Chris Almond made the result sure with a couple of minutes to go.

Chris Almond

Club Secretary Dan Roberts was celebrating his birthday, so was called upon to present the Man of the Match award to Joe Herbert.

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 2 (Monaghan, Almond) Kendal Town 0

Like last week, without the sideways snow

Prescot Cables' fixtures this season fell so we played Droylsden at home the week after we played them away. The weather was better: to quote Dickens, "It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade."

We thought we might be losing a couple of players ...

... who were then present and correct for the warm up.

Joe Herbert

It is the way it works at this time of year - our leagues have a registration deadline, the fourth Thursday in March. After this, clubs cannot make any new registrations, so most, especially those chasing promotion, ensure they have plenty of back up. Non contract players can sign for one club in each league, so clubs in the North West Counties League were busy signing players from the Northern Premier, who they may use if they are not needed for any of our games or for the week they play after we have finished our season.

We had been adding to the squad, with Michael 'MJ' Monaghan coming on from the bench.

Michael Monaghan

We started with a quick move forwards, as I was making my way round from photographing the teams lining up. I had one minute in the golden goal, but keeper Richie Branagan gathered from James Edgar and sent my ticket down the tubes.

I was in position to catch Baba Conteh open the scoring three minutes later.

I have talked about the tenth of a second that cannot teach before: this picture proved very popular, but it would have been better if I had caught the ball three feet closer to Baba's head. Still, a goal is a goal, and does not go uncelebrated.

Just to show I sometimes get a header at the moment of execution ...

Harry Cain

There is no bad time to score, but just before half time is often considered to be particularly good, as the opposition will go in with a bigger job to do than they were expecting. The ball fell to Chris Almond with a couple of minutes of the first half to go. He calmly took his time to line up - too calmly for the nerves of some, a veritable litter of kittens was being delivered behind the goal - and delivered the perfect shot.

Chris Almond

A goal just after the start of the second half is probably even better, as it throws the opposition manager's team talk out of the window. An opportunity fell to Man of the Match James Edgar...

... who rounded the goalkeeper ...

... avoided the defender ...

... and celebrated his goal.

It did not look as though the visitors would make a reply, but they were able to score a consolation goal just on full time, leaving us with the same score, although fortunately not the same weather, as last week.

I grabbed a couple of crowd shots.

The Fence End spot the camera ...

... and pose for their photo.

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 3 (Conteh, Almond, Edgar) Droylsden 1.

It's why we watch

By all accounts, Tadcaster Albion had more than a spot of bother on their journey to Prescot Cables. It is a journey that the east - west split of the League's First Divisions taking effect from next season should eliminate: our visitors had to navigate round both Leeds and Manchester in the early evening. The M6 is not without its issues, but the change should bring improvements for many clubs.

The visitors were sporting a smart two tone blue kit. I was wondering how it would come out under the floodlights - it reproduced quite well.

Josh Klein-Davies

Both sides had chances, and defended well. The visitors seemed to have overcome their earlier difficulties, as they were first to score, from a slightly lucky bounce half an hour in.

We were stronger in the second half, and the pace of the game can be described as furious. The pictures reflect this, with more coming from this half.

Valter Fernandes

However, it looked as though we were not having any luck this evening. There were more chances for both sides, but we were unable to equalise, or the visitors to make the result secure.

This changed a minute from time, when the ball fell to James Edgar who put it away from a tight angle. Celebrations broke out, but captain James McCulloch is never satisfied with an equaliser when there is time to score a winner.

As James Edgar celebrates, James McCulloch gets everyone back for the kick off

There was to be a long period of injury time, with both sides throwing everything at claiming all three points. Five minutes in, Lloyd Dean toook a shot from the edge of the area - Dr Phil later commented on the video that "he had no right to score from there".

Lloyd Dean lines up to shoot for goal

Scenes ensued.

Everyone went to join the Dean family in celebration, including an impressive turn of speed from Ben Barnes. A few weeks ago, my counterpart Ben from Needham Market tweeted a goal celebration with the comment, "If only you could see my face when a player runs towards you ...". I replied that I hoped he was calm, composed and concentrating on getting his picture. Well, I am 30 years older than him!

Reece Fishwick and Harry Cain

In the background, the referee is giving Lloyd Dean an unsurprising yellow card for excessive celebration. Of course, we thought there was nothing excessive about it, a last minute comeback is the sort of thing people watch the game for.

Tadcaster may have thought their evening could not get much worse: unfortunately they were wrong, as they had to go the long way round with the M62 being closed.

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 2 (Edgar, Dean) Tadcaster Albion 1