Pitch Not So Perfect As Tad Come Unstuck In The Cables

Manager Billy Miller made four changes to the League Cup victory at Frickley Athletic with Josh Greening, Conor Sellars, Josh Grant and Gregg Anderson all back in from the start.

Tom Corner was only fit enough for a place on the substitutes bench after going off in the opening ten minutes in midweek with a hamstring injury and The Brewers were to lose a player in the early stages once again.

Gregg Anderson was making his first start after recovering from knee surgery but unfortunately the defender pulled up inside twelve minutes with a hamstring injury of his own.

Fatlum Ibrahimi was the man to come on which saw Jason Mycoe revert back to right-back and Josh Barrett once again shift across to centre-back.

The pitch at Prescot Cables passed a 10am inspection and credit to those who worked hard to get the game on.

However, there’s no doubting that the sandy and uneven patches across the turf made it difficult for both sides to play any kind of attractive football.

Dan Thirkell did well to set Rob Youhill in behind the Cables defence but some good covering by Brad Johnstone forced the winger into rushing his shot.

The home side threatened to break the deadlock in behind several times and should have at least made Gary Stevens make a save in the 24th minute.

Defender Ben Cartwright did brilliantly to dribble the ball from his own half all the way to the right-hand by-line before pulling back to James Edgar who completely missed his kick from close range.

Taddy’s best chance of the half came nine minutes from the break when Josh Greening cleverly flicked back inside Valter Fernandes but tamely side-footed on target making it comfortable for Phil Priestley in the Cables goal.

It was a half of very few chances, but the second half saw a goal inside twenty seconds, albeit in bizarre circumstances.

There looked to be no danger as Prescot drove forward from the kick-off and Andy Milne shielded the ball back to goalkeeper Gary Stevens until the ball took a wicked bounce changing direction in the meantime and falling perfectly for Dom Marie who guided into the empty net.

It’s fair to say it was a freak goal assisted by an unpredictable pitch.

Despite Marie’s goal, The Brewers were in charge of possession and looked comfortable for most but just struggled to carve out any real clear cut chance.

As the half ticked on and Taddy pushed increasingly harder for a way back into the contest, this left the door slightly open at the back. Dom Marie had a glorious chance to seal the three points after being set one on one v Stevens but the Taddy stopper superbly saved with his foot.

With just under twenty minutes to go central defender Andy Milne was moved up into the centre forward position to give them a greater target to hit.

As much as Taddy dominated the final part of the match, they created next to nothing as long ranged efforts from Josh Grant and Fatlum Ibrahimi both failed to test Priestley.

Prescot Cables worked incredibly hard for each other and dug in when required and in the end held on to all three points.

Prescot Team: Priestley, Fernandes, Johnstone, McCulloch, Cartwright, Turner, Wynn, Simpson, Marie, Dean, Edgar

Subs: Bannister, Flood, Herbert, Scarsbrick, Doran

Tadcaster Team: Stevens, Barrett, Grant, Milne, Anderson © (Ibrahimi 13), Mycoe, Youhill (Binns 71), Thirkell, Baker, Sellars, Greening

Subs Unused: Jeff, Shepherd, Corner