Second half Harriers annihilate Macclesfield

The Harriers started this game against Macclesfield Town with a completely unchanged side from the one that got their belated first win of the season four days earlier at Cambridge Utd.  Unfortunately during the first half of todays game the Harriers failed to kick on and ride the confidence boost from the Cambridge comeback.

In fact it's very hard to successfully write a match report on what was possibly the poorest, most lacklustre forty three minutes of 'football' (I use that term loosely) seen at Aggborough all season.  The play was almost entirely played within the hosts half as Harriers struggled to find any semblance of a midfield, but fortunately the Macclesfield forwards weren't able to muster anything other than wide speculative shots.

With all vocal support soon reduce to almost continuous sarcastic cheers every time a shot or pass went astray the game was finally ignited two minutes before half time with a goal for the hosts.  (Which I shall now describe in much detail to make up for the lack of the 'First Half' word count).

The Harriers finally managed to get forward without the sight of a waving offside flag and forced a corner.  Callum Gittings then found himself standing majestically over the corner ball, considering his options and faced with a box of snarling Macclesfield players.

He mustered up the courage and started his approach, a step, a stride, a slice and the ball went soaring.  Eyes lifted as attention converged on the well placed cross, the wall of men bounced looking to make contact.  Meanwhile a shadowed figure was moving as Cheyenne Dunkley positioned himself precisely and smashed home a powerful header between the outstretched hands of Lance Cronin and into the net and send to worrying low crowd into raptures.

The Harriers had stopped the previously superior visitors in their tracks but went undeservedly into the break with the advantage for the second half under their belts.

The second half finished how the first ended with Harriers looking dangerous, again helped by some strong crossing from Gittings.  Within two minutes of the half Harriers had forced a hat-trick of corners with the first attempt on goal coming from Mickey Demetriou who saw his shot parried by Cronin and slowly run out of play.

The next corner evaded four men before reaching Josh 'never-lost-a-header' Gowling whos header forced the keeper into a difficult low save.  The final corner was again well placed to find Keith Briggs but he could only head over.

The fast pace continued and five minutes later Kidderminster had doubled their lead with Ryan Rowe banging home his fourth goal in two games.  Good play from Rowe down the wing kept the ball in play, he then played it to Gittings who laid it off to Demetriou who in turn played Rowe back through into the box to slot home from a tight angle.

On fifty three minutes the Harriers then almost made it three goals.  A one-two between Rowe and Gittings creating space for James Vincent to strike but it was comfortably saved by Cronin.

Two minutes later Harriers almost let the visitors back in.  Some sloppy defending from a corner left Waide Fairhurst in loads of space but, facing the wrong direction, he seemed to attempt to do a sort of karate spinning header... it failed.

Harriers continued to go looking for goals with Briggs twice watching strikes just scrape wide in the ten minutes after the half hour mark.  We finally made it three through impact sub Marvin Johnson in the seventy third minute, with Briggs again being influential going forward, to set him through to finish magnificently past Cronin into the top corner and in turn propelling the Harriers finally out of the relegation zone.

Hopefully we'll look back on this week as the moment that turned the season.

 Goals for Harriers: Dunkley 43, Rowe 50, Johnson 73

REFEREE:

Mr P Bankes Merseyside