By Brian Bennett | Photo: Rachel McDonald

Ashington FC’s versatile left sided player Luke Salmon was adamant that the Colliers could have forced a draw or a win against King’s Lynn in their Emirates FA Cup tie at The Walks on Saturday.

The Woodhorn Lane outfit – who have performed heroics throughout an exciting and fantastic run where they beat sides higher up the footballing pyramid – eventually went out at the fourth qualifying round hurdle after losing 3-1 against the Linnets in Norfolk.

Salmon, who brought the Colliers level in the contest on Saturday, said afterwards: “Obviously it’s a bit of a sad story as we have lost the game but to be honest we went into the clash with high hopes believing we could do something. Even reflecting after the match, if we had taken one or two chances we still could have got a draw or a win out of it – but we were playing against a team who are top of their league three divisions above so it was always going to be difficult.”

After Ben Stephens had opened the scoring, it was Salmon who fired in Ashington’s equaliser: “It was a perfect through ball from Dean Briggs,” he said, “I just had to hold my run a little bit then I took a touch and hit the ball through the ‘keeper’s legs. We were back to square one and I still believed we could get a result.”

Salmon thought the Colliers ‘took the game’ to their opponents from the first whistle of the second period: “For the first 15-20 minutes (of the second half) we got at them a lot. Chances have gone wide and over but it showed that we were battering them a little bit to try and get a goal. I thought the third (goal) they got was crucial but when I looked at the clock and there were still 10-15 minutes left, I still thought we had a chance as we just had to finish two chances. Then when stoppage time goes up you know time is against you. The last five minutes were really lively and the lads didn’t give up but the cup run has been brilliant and all of the lads have loved every minute of it.”