By Brian Bennett

Ashington FC manager Ian Skinner admitted to using a bit of kidology with his Guisborough counterparts in the build up to his sides quarter final match of the Ebac Northern League Division One Cup against Guisborough Town on Tuesday.

The Colliers advanced into the semi finals following a fine 3-1 win with Craig Spooner scoring a brace and Ben Sampson registering his first goal of the season.

Skinner put his skipper Ben Harmison down to wear the number six shirt and announced that the recalled Thomas Kalthoeber would wear number nine: “As a manager, you try daft little things,” he said, “When we lined up to kick off, Ben was at centre back and Thomas up front. That was for the first minute only – then they swapped positions! You just try little marginal games because if I had put Harmison on the team sheet at nine, Guisborough’s management team would instantly have thought that ‘he’s playing up front’ and they would start to plan for that – and that was even the thinking behind it for the first minute of the game.”

He continued: “Ben then drifts up front and all of a sudden they (Guisborough’s management team) realise that but the game is under way and it’s difficult for them to get messages onto the players about what they are going to do to deal with it. That was the thought process behind it – so what I’ll probably do next week in the semi final against Consett is list Ben at number nine and play him at centre back!”