Saturday, 26th January 2008
Chadderton 3-2 Ramsbottom
United (after extra time)
League Cup, Third Round
The Rams crashed out of this
seasons League Cup competition with a lacklustre display.
With four new signings on show,
Rams manager Neil Hart was forced into changes due to
suspensions to key players such as Anthony Johnson, Brenden
O`Shaughnessy, John Blackley and Gino Pulvino but it was the
visitors who started off the brightest and on four minutes, Rob
Crank scored a peach of a goal on his debut for the Rams.
Matt Ward broke forwards on the
wing and after beating his marker on the touchline he delivered
an inch perfect cross to Crank who made no mistake from six
yards as he planted his header firmly past the stranded keeper.
Two minutes later and a through
ball almost found Crank but last ditch defending prevented the
young forward from going one-on-one with the keeper.
Chadderton at this point looked a
very ordinary side the Rams away supporters where waiting for
the floodgates to open such was their play.
However, the home side gradually
got back into the game and they should have equalised when the
ball was played to the right and but for last ditch defending by
Eckersley, Campbell would have been plucking the ball out of the
net.
Chadderton started to produce some
neat flowing football but from promising positions they failed
to test Campbell and time and time again the final shot was high
and wide.
As for the Rams they could not keep
possession and far to often they gave the ball away with ease.
The second half was pretty much one
way traffic with Chadderton causing the Rams all sorts of
problems and when they finally equalised it came as no
surprise. A neat throughball found Cregan and with
Campbell coming off his line, the ball was played around the
keeper before being smashed low and hard into the empty net.
Within a minute of the restart
Chadderton took the lead. A dubious freekick was awarded to
the home side on the right hand side of the box and as Neville
played the ball around the wall, keeper Martin Campbell and his
defence failed to clear and the ball somehow found itself
curling into the bottom corner of the goal.
More chances fell to Chadderton but
in the dying seconds of the game the Rams broke forwards. The
ball was played into the area and it was Eckersley who was first
on hand to smash an unstoppable shot past the keeper.
Injury time saw much more of the
same with Chadderton being the better side but they had to wait
until the second period of extra before they finally got their
winner.
A cross was played into the area
but Campbell could only parry the ball to the feet of Fulham who
made no mistake from 5 yards.
Overall a very poor performance by
the Rams and now with just pride to play for in the league,
manager Neil Hart will be hoping to start picking up points
sooner, rather than later.
Ramsbottom team
: Campbell, McAllister,
Eckersley, Williams (c), Winstanley, Eames, McNally, Bankroft,
Crank, Ward, Pearson. Subs: Reidy, McLellan,
Kay, Sensale, Bagdagi
