Harsh penalty sends Boro to first defeat

NORTH WEST COUNTIES DIVISION ONE BACUP BOROUGH ........... 0 CAMMELL LAIRD ........... 1 BACUP Borough suffered their first defeat of the season, falling foul of a harsh penalty decision at home against Cammell Laird.

The visitors were very much on the front foot from the off, putting the Bacup rearguard to the test for long periods of the first half.

This was mainly as a result of the Bacup midfield not being able to get to grips with their counterparts in the centre of the park.

For long stretches of the contest, Cammell Laird’s Thomas Brian just sat in front of the defence, always in space, constantly pulling the strings with intelligent, quality passing which constantly put the Bacup backline to the test.

Bacup appeared to have seen out the first half without conceding a goal – considering the pressure they were encountering they would have done well to do so.

But with only seven minutes to go to the break, their resolve was finally broken when Bacup’s young on loan defender Markell Foulds was penalised for a foul on the opposition striker. It was a tough decision to take, as it appeared the youngster was being leant on rather than committing an offence.

The referee ruled that Foulds had a hand in the striker’s back and awarded the penalty which was duly converted.

Laird had been knocking on the door for long periods of the half and would argue they were good value for the one-goal advantage – but the penalty award was cheap to say the least.

It was no surprise that, at the half time break, Bacup Borough manager Brent Peters made his first change, bringing on experienced striker Matthew Barlow to counteract the service coming from Laird’s Thomas Brian.

Barlow replaced Davison Banda and Bacup, while not as fluent has in previous games, never the less improved on their first half showing.

Peters soon made his second substitution, bringing off Josh Walne and replacing him with Benjamin Rhodes, who, with virtually his first touch, linked up play with Barlow resulting in a good effort on goal.

The home side were seeing a lot of the ball but constantly their midfield pairing of Collinson and James Constantine would fail when it mattered in producing that quality final ball which would have opened up Laird’s defence.

It was most certainly not one of their better afternoons, which probably explained why Bacup could not find that all elusive goal to get them back on level terms.

With ten minutes remaining Peters introduced his third substitute, another striker in Tre-Carmichael Baldwin-Willis, replacing midfielder Constantine.

With four strikers now on the pitch in an effort to salvage at least one point, Bacup gave it a good go.

Baldwin-Willis collected the ball with his back to goal, turned and faced up before letting go a terrific strike which was inches wide of the post.

Further half chances came Bacup’s way but with Cammell Laird back in numbers determined to hang onto their slender one goal lead, it was never going to be their day.