Colwyn Bay 2 Altrincham 1

UniBond Premier League

Presidents Cup

10 December   2002.

Summary and other details by John Laidlar. His full report is in the Official Site by John Laidlar

Colwyn Bay had been two minutes away from defeating Radcliffe Borough in the UniBond Challenge Cup 2nd Round when a Niell Hardy equaliser sent the tie to extra time, which the Welsh side lost and which consigned them to the President's Cup. For their part, Alty had "qualified" for the President's Cup by losing at home to Hyde United in the Challenge Cup.

The game was played on a bitterly cold night but Old Colwyn thankfully did not experience the biting easterly winds that were blowing in Altrincham this evening. The Llanelian Road pitch looked in good condition for what was the Bay's first home game for more than a month.

Altrincham rested seven regular first-teamer regulars (Acton, Maddox, Craney, Scott, Rose, Smith and Thornley) whilst Ryan, Rowland and Murphy remained sidelined by injury. In fact, six of the Altrincham starters tonight had started two or fewer previous games for the Robins this season (Edginton, Shuttleworth, McEvoy, Robinson, Lunt and Tunnicliffe), whilst Killeen, (on the bench), had not played previously at all for the first team. Indeed, the squad contained three teenage Youth team players (Lunt, McEvoy and Killeen). Kurt Edginton kept his place in goal after deputising well for Acton at Marine last week. Barry Shuttleworth started his first game since his return to Altrincham and Andy McDonald returned to partner him in midfield. The versatile Peter Band started this time at the back, leaving Steve Lunt and the on-loan James Robinson (from Crewe Alex.) up front.

The Bay also started without some regulars; Deiniol Graham, Lee Coathup and Marc Limbert were all on the bench. Returning in goal was Boswell, who has just recovered from a knee operation. Ex-Alty man Carl Furlong was captain of the Bay side. Former Alty defender Stuart Scheuber featured on the front of the Bay programme but he was not on view tonight as he has now moved on to Flexsys Cefn Druids in the League of Wales. The referee, Ian Faulkner from Liverpool, was also not unknown to Altrincham fans as he had run the line at Alty's FA Cup 2nd Round match against Darlington last season.

Not a good evening but as some of our fans chanted after the final whistle "We are out and were glad we are" . The lighting was very poor so that the only pictures worth publishing were those in which there was very little movement. It was also very cold, I now have a physical test  for the temperature - my camera, the batteries of which are reduced in efficiency as the temperature decreases. Normally I use two batteries one per per half this evening I used three and the third ran out 15 minutes before the final whistle

Ex-Alty player Carl Furlong who scored both of the Bay's goals must be moon struck as he points to that heavenly body . Andy McDonald looks on

Steve Lunt on the attack

Carl Furlong gets into the act again is he talking to the referee or is the referee talking to him?

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