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First home defeat of season


The Harriers went down to their first home defeat of the season today in a disappointing 2-0 reversal to an ordinary looking Macclesfield side.  After last weeks brilliant team performance against Hull City today's game had a bit of 'after the Lord Mayors show' feeling about it.

There was a debut for Kenny Coleman, on loan from Wolves.  He replaced Mark Clyde who had been recalled by Wolves because of international duty and an injury crisis.

Drewe Broughton missed the game through suspension and also out was Dean Bennett.  He had been sent home from training yesterday, presumably through illness.

Kicking off in brilliant sunshine with the Reds attacking the College End it was Macclesfield who dominated the early proceedings.  Their first attempt on goal coming after just three minutes when Whitaker had a hopeful shot from 20yds out easily saved by Stuart Brock.

A few minutes later it was the same man who popped up again but his shot was wildly mis-hit and ended up in the back of the stand.

Scott Stamps The Harriers were struggling to make their presence felt and passes were going astray, mainly from Danny Williams and Scott Stamps.  Normally you can depend on these two but not today.

It took a shot from Tipton to wake the sleeping giants up.  His shot from outside the area went straight at Brockie but from the clearance Coleman played the ball out to Melligan who then played it on for Shilton.  Coleman was waiting for the return ball and when it came he tested 'chicken legs' Wilson with a shot from 20yds out.

Next up to try his luck was Ian Foster and he should really have scored when he ran onto a mistake from a Macc defender but he took the ball too far to the touchline and his cross shot was easily saved by Wilson.

On 30 minutes we conceded our first home goal since we played Darlington back in August.

A free kick was conceded on the edge of the area and the supposedly suspended Michael Welch drove the ball through the wall from 20 yards out.  Brockie got a hand to it but could only help the ball trickle into the back of his net.

Now was the time for us to pick our game up but we didn't seem to have the capability.  We were clearly lacking a target man with Drewe missing and even though we were playing the ball on the floor more than in recent games the forward line just seemed to be a second too late each time.  The pairing of Bo and Fozzie was just not working.

Before the break Stamper had a shot fly into the side netting when there were players better placed to do something with it.  At least he was making an effort.


HT. 0 - 1

The Reds were a bit late coming out for the second half.  Britt's speech must have been a long one!

It didn't seem to have worked because they were almost two down within minutes of the restart when, after Bo had been sent crashing after being elbowed in the face, Lightbourne broke away and went round the remonstrating Brock to pop the ball into the empty net.  Luckily for us the linesman had flagged for offside.

Bo Henriksen Pity the ref hadn't seen the incident that preceeded it and the pushing from at least four Macclesfield players on Henriksen.  An alert ref would have stopped the game, this one didn't blink an eyelid.

The incident spurred the Harriers into life and first Shilton then Foster had chances to score but each time they came to nothing.

A terrible error by Brock almost let in Tipton when his weak strike flew straight back to the grateful goalkeeper after he had cleared the ball straight into his path.

After more lacklustre play from both sides and a flurry of substitutions Macclesfield sealed the points with a fine goal from debutant David Eaton.  He had been bought on to replace Tipton minutes earlier and with his first touch of the ball he had scored with a diving header from Lightbourne's perfect left-wing cross.

The game was over by then so Britt took off the tiring Coleman and bought on Daire Doyle.  We could really have done with someone to come on and give us that missing spark but we had no one on the bench with that capability.

Our unbeaten run came to an end when the expectations had been so high but with a performance as poor as this we never deserved a draw let alone a win.   All good things come to an end one day, why did it have to be today!


FT. 0 - 2

The Harriers-Online
Man of the Match is : 
John 'JJ' Melligan

Kept probing from midfield right up to the end but he can't do it all by himself.


vote for your
man of the match now

Harriers  subs   cards      Macclesfield  subs   cards 
Brock     Wilson  
Coleman     Hitchin  
Stamps     Adams  
Williams     Tinson  
Hinton     Ridler  
Ayres     Lightbourne  
Melligan     Tipton  
Flynn     Hardy
Henriksen     Whitaker  
Foster     Welch
Shilton     O'Neill  
SUBS:       SUBS:    
Danby     Martin  
Joy     Robinson  
Doyle     Askey  
Ducros     Abbey  
Smith     Eaton  

REFEREE:
Mr C Boyeson
East Yorkshire


links to some
macclesfield websites:

official site
silk web
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