Wetherby Road record stays intact
IT’S a fact that when we’ve played at Weatherby Road, Harrogate, we’ve never failed to score and after Saturday’s performance that record has continued and in some style.
It was a truly entertaining game that County dominated.
It was the third time we’d met this season, firstly in the League Cup where a solitary penalty from Connor Jennings gave us the win.
The second was a bore draw at EP back in September.
Just as important was that this game gave Ben Hinchliffe his record breaking 307th appearance as our number 1, an amazing achievement in this day and age of professional football.
Pre-game there was mass confusion on the Flyer as the coach driver had been given details that took us miles away from the usual dropping point to a Sport and Leisure Centre that was basically down a forest trail with a car park at the end.
After some shunting around our man at the wheel took the decision to head back the way we came to the ground which led to a “discussion” with several stewards who all had a different opinion.
We disembarked and went into the ground, at least those of us who had a valid ticket did!
It turned out that one of the turnstile scanners wasn’t working which resulted in a number of us had to get reticketed at the home ticket office, it was pandemonium on Weatherby Road.
Thankfully there was a football match to calm the nerves.
From the kick-off we took full control, all the play was in the Harrogate half and it was no surprise when Myles Hippolyte latched onto a smart pass from Kyle Wootton just outside the box, his pace left the home defence standing statue like and then the cleanest of shots into the back of the net.
And 15 minutes later Tanto Olaofe opened his County account with another smart finish in a crowded penalty area. We were cruising through the game with no problems. Then at the start of second half Harrogate hit a purple patch which resulted in a shot low down from a tight angle that Ben could only parry into the net.
Squeaky bum time. There were a number of substitutes, they took off their number 4, Falkingham, who’d been man marking Will Collar, we brought on Ryan Rydel. Within a minute Rydel had crossed the ball and Collar headed us back into a two-goal lead.
From then on it was a matter of game control, which we did to great effect and saw out the win.