Match report taken from Barrow Town website The injury and suspension hit Riversiders were far from their best, but did just enough to return home with three points. The game will be remembered however for an inconsistent performance from the officials that saw both teams reduced to ten men. The Riversiders were hit by a number of late withdrawals from the squad due to illness and injury, and with the reserves having already travelled for their fixture against Saffron Dynamo, were forced to name just two regular first team substitutes. First team management John Folwell, Adam Beazeley and Paul Yeomans were forced to dress in order to add numbers to the squad. The game was hampered by length of the grass on the Nomads pitch which meant the match was always going to be direct in its nature. After a quiet opening quarter, Anstey took the lead in the twentieth minute when a free kick from the half way line was driven deep in to the box. The cross was headed goalwards by the Anstey central defender, only for the looping header to drop against the crossbar. York responded quickest to the rebound, controlling on his chest before beating Wilcox from close range. Anstey were buoyed by their goal, but despite dominating possession for a ten minute spell, failed to test Wilcox in the Riversiders goal. Barrow levelled the scores in the 39th minute after good work from Michael Paparozzi. The midfielder showed great skill on the left hand side before picking out Scott Maclennan at the far post who showed great composure to volley home. Within minutes, it looked like the fiery targetman had added his second goal of the game, only to be undone by the first of many bizarre decisions from the match official. Maclennan latched on to Pitmans flick, stood in a clearly offside position, to run clear through on goal, and managed to evade the defenders last gasp tackle. Despite being clipped, Maclennan smashed a right foot half valley beyond the goalkeeper before tumbling to the ground. As the striker rose to his feet to celebrate his strike, the referee pulled play back to the edge of the box and chalked off the goal, instead brandishing the red card to the dismayed Anstey centre half. From the resulting free kick, Paparozzis curling strike was held by the goalkeeper as the first half came to an end. The referee hadn’t quite finished however, as the home sides manager Andy Miller was then sent to the stand for querying the red card as the officials left the pitch. Half Time: Anstey Nomads 1 Barrow Town 1 Anstey came out for the second half lining up with a 4-4-1 formation, intent to get ten men behind the ball and make life difficult for the Riversiders. The tactic worked well, as it was often Nomads that looked more likely to score with the home side resulting to long balls behind the Barrow defence. Despite the one man advantage, Barrow failed to press home their advantage, the only real chance falling to Fitzpatrick who broke clear, only for his chipped effort to clear the crossbar. That was to be Fitzpatricks last contribution, as within minutes the front man was shown the second red card of the match. Breaking clear, the forward was pulled back by the cumbersome Oliver Preston. Expecting a free kick to be awarded, words were exchanged between the two players as they squared up. Embarrassingly, despite the defender being twice the size of Fitzpatrick, he collapsed to the ground holding his face, feigning injury. The referee, forty yards behind play, brandished the striker with a straight red card. With both teams reduced to ten men and playing with just one striker, the match could have gone either way. For a long period, it looked as if the game would peter out to a draw. However, it was Barrow who snatched the winner as perhaps justice was served with just fifteen minutes remaining. Craig Nobles deft header was missed by Preston and the ball was seized upon by Rob Pitman (pictured) who ran clear and steered the ball beyond Stef Joyce in to the net. Although Anstey pressed for an equaliser in the final fifteen minutes, Nomads didn’t test Wilcox with any efforts of real note, bar a late cross cum shot which drifted beyond the far post. As the final whistle sounded, Barrow were undoubtedly relieved to return home with three points, against an Anstey team which has improved 110% from last season and will undoubtedly pick up a number of points between now and next April. |