Weather issues once again determined where Ferryhill Athletic played their latest ‘home’ game, reports Chris Orton, and it was to the Bobby Robson Centre in Ushaw Moor where they faced Birtley Town Reserves in the quarter-final of the Washington Aged Persons Trophy.
Followed by a good-sized crowd, manager Lee Jewett went with an experienced starting line-up.
It didn’t take long before Athletic took the lead through top-scorer, Adam Morland, who fired past the opposition’s keeper with ease.
Ferryhill dominated the early stages, playing good passing football and demonstrating some terrific link-up play.
They doubled their lead soon after, with Matthew Agar scoring following a huge long throw-in from Kieran Gillham.
Birtley got one back and began to take more control of the match but, thankfully for the home side, wasted a free-kick on the edge of Ferryhill’s penalty box.
One of the moments of the game came shortly before half-time when Matthew Agar leapt like a salmon, three minutes into added time, to plant a header in the net.
Ferryhill continued to dominate in the second half, with further goals from Agar and a penalty from Adam Morland.
Birtley never stopped battling but were unable to break down Ferryhill and Athletic made it 6-1 through man of hte match, Kieron Richardson who seemed to score direct from a corner.
Richardson got the seventh soon after this, with Chris Devine rounding off the scoring to give a final score of 8-1.
An unfortunate incident near the end saw a player sent off for each side, but this couldn’t tarnish one of Ferryhill’s best performances of the season.
The side now progress to the semi-final of the cup and, as the fixtures pile up, play their next league game while the Chapter goes to press, when they visit Consett AFC Reserves on Tuesday night, 20 February.
This weekend, on Saturday, they host Billingham Town Reserves, also in the league.
Ferryhill & Chilton's local community newspaper.
