Norwood’s last-gasp leveller to the rescue

A JAMES Norwood equaliser saved the blushes of Tranmere boss Micky Mellon who was relieved his side will “live to fight another day”.

Rovers had led through Connor Jennings, but Kabongo Tshimanga hit back twice to put the non-league side in front.

Jennings levelled 11 minutes from time, but Tshimanga completed a stunning hattrick four minutes later, before Norwood netted very late on to force a replay.

Jennings’ low drilled strike on 34 minutes looked to put Tranmere in a comfortable position, but Tshimanga had other ideas, going around Scott Davies to score before the break and then drilling another past him 24 minutes from time.

Oxford could do nothing to stop Jennings heading home Ollie Banks’ cross only to go back in front soon after as Tshimanga claimed the match ball.

Norwood’s sweet half volley, avoided huge embarrassment for Rovers,

Mellon said: “Every credit to Oxford City. They’ve come here and they’ve scored three goals and they find themselves really unhappy.

“If someone had said they’d scored three goals here, you’d think they’d be in the next round.

“We’re still in the hat, that’s the positive. It doesn’t need me to stand here and try and be clever and tell everyone about how that was different to what we normally do. I think we all know that.

“You could pull anybody that watches Tranmere out of the crowd and they would tell you pretty much everything that I could tell you now. Oxford can consider themselves very unlucky that they get to that stage and score that third goal and they don’t put us out. We live to fight another day.”

City boss Mark Jones said: “I’m a little bit disappointed to concede so late in the game, but our performance was excellent. “We’ve gone in the lead twice and to not be able to hold it out is slightly disappointing but, having said that, you have to give our players tremendous credit.

“We’ve given absolutely everything. I think we played some good stuff, at times we looked dangerous going forward. I couldn’t have asked for any more from our lads.

“I would have absolutely taken a draw before the game, just slightly disappointed that we couldn’t hang on for the win.”