QUIGLEY’S QUICK TO FINISH OFF GLOVERS!
THE Yeovil fans that arrived at half-time had only witnessed 44 seconds of football by the time Scott Quigley scored what turned out to be the winning goal for Barrow at a typically windy Holker Street.
This match marked the 40th anniversary of the National League, almost to the day after these two clubs had met on the opening day of the maiden season of what was then called the Alliance Premier League.
Just as then, it was the Bluebirds who came out on top and although Quigley won’t go on to score as many goals for Barrow as their hero of 1979 Colin Cowperthwaite managed, he’s making a good early impression.
This was the striker’s third goal in three games and it re“I warded a performance that showed his team can roll their sleeves up when required and not just produce the attractive football they’re more noted for.
It was a game of very few chances, in truth, with the supporters who came in late (the majority of the 72-strong away contingent) due to their bus breaking down en route having little to shout about.
Not that this mattered to Barrow manager Ian Evatt, who said: “I think we deserved it, though I wish someone would turn this wind machine off up here because it seems to be fine throughout the week then on Saturday it seems to turn on.
think the first half was scrappy, but in the second half we came into it a lot better and I thought we had the chances to really kill them off.
“I must give credit to the goalkeeper and the back four – I thought they were magnificent today. They’ve had to answer some criticism.
“Jason Taylor has moved back there and I thought him and Sam Hird were magnificent. It’s just frustrating that we’re not killing teams off with these chances.”
Without putting too fine a point on it, the first half was just awful, with the live BT Sport cameras in attendance as part of the National League’s big birthday celebrations.
The clearest opportunity during it came after 20 minutes when Lewis Hardcastle went on
a good run before laying the ball off for John Rooney, who placed a shot from the edge of the area narrowly wide.
Barrow then caught Yeovil cold by taking the lead less than a minute into the second half when Quigley turned well in the box before passing his shot into the bottom corner.
Openings were still at a premium, but the Bluebirds should have been 2-0 ahead when Dior Angus somehow scooped over the bar from inside the sixyard box after Olly Dyson had helped back Brad Barry’s cross.
Some brilliant work from Dyson down the left then almost led to a second for Quigley, as he tricked his way through before fizzing a low ball across goal that his front man couldn’t quite reach.
The missed chances didn’t prove costly, however, as Yeovil never really threatened an equaliser, nor add to the one shot on target they managed from Lawson D’Ath in the fourth minute.
Their boss Darren Sarll, who was appointed in the summer and charged with trying to return the Gloves to the Football League, was frustrated with the outcome and says his side need to take hold of games.
He said: “It was a rubbish game. Sometimes the two teams have to play in certain conditions, or they have to play in certain runs of form and it creates a lack of a spectacle.
“There can’t be many worse games on live TV than that, but it’s a game we should have taken a point from.
“It’s a game where we didn’t really have enough aggression in there to really dictate, scoring two or three goals.
“Our best chance of the first half, with [Miles] Hippolyte, we passed up and until Charlie Lee came on with the set plays, we looked a bit toothless.”