Cheadle Town 2-2 Silsden
In contrast to the lack of endeavour in the second half at Abbey Hulton the other night, we got it in spades this time thus earning a well-deserved point against one of the two teams that will surely be playing Premier Division football next season.
We restricted the league leaders to very little in the second half thus allowing ourselves to claw back a two-goal disadvantage.
It took until the 67th minute for our improved performance to bite. Joe Nield - who had a superb match at right-back - put in a delicious, hanging cross right onto the path of an unmarked Rick Whyatt to plunge an unstoppable header past the Silsden keeper.
That one marked goal number 20 for Mr Whyatt in all competitions this season.
A double-substitution shortly afterwards saw Luke Farrow enter the fray, and it was he who got our equaliser with nine minutes remaining.
A ranging, diagonal ball over to the left tempted the Silsden keeper out of his area to come and collect it but he wasn't as equal to the ball as Luke who stole in and planted it home.
With injury time looming we almost nicked all three points as Callum Collinson hooked just wide following a free-kick but the point was just reward for the second-half performance, thank you very much.
The first half was mainly Silsden's as they raced to that two-goal lead within the first half hour.
After just three minutes - we have developed a really bad habit of conceding early - a ball through the middle was collected by Aidan Kirby who saw Danny Whiting coming off his line and coolly lobbed him.
Danny then had to perform two key blocks with barely ten minutes on the clock before John McLaughlin was desperately unlucky when his snap-shot from the edge of the area struck the foot of the post with the Silsden keeper rooted.
Luke Cotton was then put through on the right on 11 minutes but scuffed his shot wide before Silsden's Barnes rattled the crossbar with a long-range effort.
On the half-hour the visitors got their second goal after we failed to clear a corner in from the left, allowing Reece Kendall to eventually nod it home from close range.
Weather permitting we have another home match tomorrow evening [Wednesday 4th April] and then, thankfully, a weekend off before a really grueling end of season run-in.
TEAM: Whiting, Nield, McLaughlin, Holt (Plumb), Shaw, Harrison, Dunn, Wood, Cotton (Collinson), Whyatt, C Sherrington (Farrow). SUBS: Collinson, Plumb, Farrow, Piggott (gk).
