Ashton Athletic struggled in the conditions tonight to find their game. A hard working and well organized AFC Blackpool side took their chance and left Brocstedes with all 3 points.
The game started off very scrappily with no team taking control. Indeed the first attempt on goal taking 15 minutes to come, which was a shot just over the bar from Ashton's No. 7 Paul Watson.
The Blackpool forwards looked lively and were quite pacey and needed our full attention as the rain began to fall. The surface quickly became a test for the players as the ball skidded off the ground.
Set pieces looked most likely as we had a couple of free kicks, Ian Rowlands having a powerful header saved well by the Blackpool keeper from a corner.
The only goal of the game came from a break down the left and Willerby the AFC No. 10 finished well. 1-0 to the visitors
We tried hard to level the score before half time, Cal Mahoney having the best effort with a quality run and shot again over the bar.
The second half continued in much the same vein as the rain continued to fall making it difficult to keep the ball for any length of time. Danny Regan had a superb run down the right beating two men and crossing the ball to the far post. His opposite wing back Paul Casey took the shot first time on the volley, but skewed it wide of the post.
As Ashton continued to press, Blackpool continued to get 10 men behind the ball and were very well organised, this along with some obvious time wasting began to frustrate us making it very difficult to get any momentum.
As we pushed more men forward Blackpool were always ready to counter and created some excellent chances, bringing about a string of fantastic saves from Martin Pearson in the Ashton goal, who kept us in the game. One of these breaks from AFC's No. 10 brought about a clear foul in our box and the penalty was awarded. Thankfully the spot kick was squandered wide, clipping our keepers left hand post.
This seemed to spur us on again as we pressed hard for the equaliser, creating 2 quality chances, sadly we failed to convert, the conditions perhaps playing their part again.
The game really was end to end in the final minutes and thankfully we had Pearson to thank for 2 more brilliant saves. Unfortunately it was a similar story to the Padiham game at the weekend as again we seem to have no luck going our way.
It's early days yet and plenty more games to come to put things right. The next game being away to Nelson on Saturday with a 3 pm kick off.