Guisborough Town 3 Marske United 1

GUISBOROUGH Town finished an eventful season with a flourish last Friday evening as they completed a league and cup treble over arch-rivals Marske United to finish third.

Both sides were playing their third game of the week, but they served up a high-tempo and unrelentingly competitive match which was a huge credit to every player.

Watched by a healthy crowd of 310, Guisborough tore into their derby rivals from the first whistle and Marske, who finished runners-up to league champions Shildon, were two goals down after just seven minutes.

Young Guisborough striker Connor Smith capped a superb season with another wonderful goal in the fourth minute, again showing the persistence and pace which has earned him 22 goals, many of them after coming on as a substitute.

Just three minutes later, Smith’s strike partner Danny Earl bagged his 41st goal of the campaign with a trademark burst into the box and a clinical finish.

In the 18th minute, Guisborough keeper Nick Liversedge pulled off the kind of save he has been making all season when he acrobatically tipped over a stinging shot from Jamie Owens to preserve Town’s two-goal lead.

But he could do nothing to prevent Marske pulling a goal back four minutes before half-time when full back Josh Myers made a full-blooded challenge for a 50-50 ball and the ball flew off his foot from fully 45 yards out and dipped at the last second into the top corner of Guisborough’s net.

It was a lifeline Marske scarcely deserved after Guisborough had almost completely dominated the first half with some fast, fluent and penetrating attacking play.

In the 53rd minute, Earl almost restored Guisborough’s two-goal cushion with a powerful strike that produced an excellent save from Marske keeper Robert Dean.

But, in the 71st minute, Earl and Smith linked up brilliantly again, with the former finishing off superbly to chalk up his 42nd goal of the season and restore Guisborough's two-goal lead at 3-1.

Guisborough manager Steve Dowling was delighted with the result and performance, particularly as it came just two days after the tired Priorymen had lost 2-0 at Morpeth.

He said: “I thought we played some really good football against Marske and built up an early two-goal lead with excellent goals from Connor Smith and Danny Earl, who once again caused the Marske defence all kinds of problems.

"Our midfield duo of Steve Snaith and Chay Liddle dominated the central areas of the pitch and, with Jordan Galloway and Andy May solid in defence, Nick had little to do in goal until a freak clearance somehow ended up in our net from over 40 yards out.

"In the second half Marske created more opportunities, but our counter-attacks caused major problems for the Marske defence and only a couple of excellent saves from the visiting keeper kept the score down. However, we got a well-deserved third goal after good work from Smith set Earl up to score his second.”

Credit goes to the managerial duo of Dowling and Dave Markham, who took over the reins following the departure of Chris Hardy to Whitby at the end of November.

Hardy was a hard act to follow, but there has been a seamless continuation of the same brand of passing and fluent football that has earned Guisborough richly-deserved praise throughout the league.