Guisborough Town 0 Padiham 3

GUISBOROUGH Town’s hopes of a morale-boosting cup run were dashed at the KGV Stadium last Saturday when they were knocked out of the FA Vase by Lancashire side Padiham.

The 3-0 scoreline slightly flattered the North West Counties Premier League side from near Burnley, but they deserved their victory with an impressive second-half performance after an even first half.

Guisborough had to put out yet another makeshift team, with five players unavailable due to loan restrictions or being cup-tied and a further five regular players still on the injury list.

Their unprecedented run of serious injuries got even worse when striker Connor Smith had to be helped from the field 10 minutes from the end of the first half in obvious pain and distress after what looked like an innocent clash on the halfway line. He was taken to hospital by his parents and is likely to be out for at least six weeks with a suspected broken jaw.

The first-half action swung from one end to the other and only a series of top-drawer saves by Guisborough’s James Dawson and Padiham’s Michael Donlan kept the game scoreless at half-time.

Dawson was at full stretch to tip a 25-yard piledriver from Padiham’s Joe Whittington over the bar in the ninth minute and two minutes later it was Donlan’s turn to brilliantly save a superb effort from Thibault Charmey.

In the 22nd minute, Dawson made another fine save, this time from Keiron Pickup's shot from 25 yards. Five minutes later, Alexander Murphy’s pinpoint cross found centre forward James Dean completely unmarked, but his header was well held by the diving Dawson.

Five minutes before half-time, Dean crossed to Pickup, whose header flashed just wide. In first-half stoppage time, Guisborough had a great chance to take the lead when Charmey burst through, but he tamely scuffed his shot straight to Donlan.

Padiham went on the attack after the interval and Dawson had to be alert to make a good save from a Whittington shot, but Padiham’s pressure paid off in the 50th minute when Pickup scored with a fierce shot from about 20 yards out.

On the hour mark, Guisborough had a great chance to equalise when Liam McPhillips put over a superb cross, but Charmey’s effort went wide.

Dean was causing the Guisborough defence problems and he almost doubled his side’s lead on 59 minutes, but his shot went a whisker wide. In the 71st minute, a Charmey effort was pushed just wide of the post by Donlan, but Padiham doubled their lead on 79 minutes when Dawson could only parry a Dean shot into the path of substitute Aaron Taylor, who had the simple task of tapping home.

A minute later, Guisborough substitute Paul Blake had a good chance, but his shot went straight to Donlan. Then, four minutes from time, Padiham made absolutely sure of victory when Mark Coyne made a brilliant run down the right wing and his great cross was turned in at the near post by Dean to make it 3-0.

After the game, Town manager Steve Dowling said: “Today's game was frustrating with us yet again being unable to involve players who were either cup-tied, injured or unable to play because of loan deal restrictions. As if that wasn’t enough, we lost striker Connor Smith with a suspected broken jaw after only 35 minutes – if we didn’t have bad luck, we wouldn’t have any luck, as the old saying goes.

“I cannot fault the lads’ commitment as they went about their task, but after a good first-half performance we were ultimately beaten by the better side. We now need to regroup and, with no game in midweek, we can train and prepare for next Saturday’s vital game against Chester-le-Street. Hopefully, by then we will have more players available again.”

The game against fellow strugglers Chester-le-Street kicks off at the KGV at 3pm tomorrow.

Guisborough will hope to have several injury strugglers back in the frame and also available again will be on-loan players, plus Dave Onions and new signing Adrei Ardulean, a highly-promising Romanian signed in midweek from Durham City.