Match Report

FC United threw away a 3-1 lead against the ten men of York City and with it made their slim hopes of survival look even less likely, leaving themselves five points from safety with six games left.

The evening had started positively, and to be honest a good chunk of the evening was the same, with FC looking dangerous from the off and just as they had done on Saturday they found themselves a goal to the good early on thanks to a well taken goal from Dale Whittam.

But as we’ve often done after taking an early lead, the team seemed to sit deep and invite pressure from the visitors. So it was no surprise that Macauly Langstaff equalised with a simple goal just before the half hour mark.

Whitham provided a moment of magic to restore the lead just five minutes later as he shifted the ball onto his left and fired home a beautiful goal from outside of the box. But the drama for the first half wasn’t finished there as Adriano Moke received two quick yellow cards in the space of three minutes for two needless and reckless challenges.

With a goal lead and against ten men a goal early in the second half would put FC in a dream position, that dream was realised within four minutes of the restart after some good work on the left by Bannister saw a ball floated into the box and cushioned into the back of the net by Kurt Willoughby.

Two goals up and with a man advantage it would take some comeback for FC to not take all three points from this, but if the truth be told FC’s performance dipped as the minutes went on and as the opposition became stronger towards the end, the FC players looked tired and out of ideas and there was nothing much positive from this point.

That being said when it got to the last twenty minutes and we were still 3-1 up, you felt we could still hang onto a precious three points.

The visitors grabbed a goal back through Wes York in the 72nd minute and four minutes later Langstaff grabbed his second to level the game and from a comfortable position at the start of the half FC looked like they were hanging on.

Some resolute defending and a few good saves from Fisher made sure we took a point away from the game, but with Guisley beating Curzon Ashton the gap between ourselves and safety became five points, but with goal difference we need to turn around six points over the Yorkshire outfit with just six games remaining.

It would be the most positive fan who believed we are going to pull this off now, but come rain or shine the Red flag will still be flying high and the key to any safety battle starts this coming Saturday when we welcome bottom side Nuneaton to Broadhurst Park.


Website man of the match: Dale Whitham – Anything good that FC did in the game came through Whitham and he grabbed two goals, the second of which would have been worthy of gracing any game.