By Brian Bennett
Ashington FC manager Ian Skinner was delighted on Saturday night after his side had picked up another three points following a 3-0 victory over Redcar Athletic at Green Lane.
However the boss – who is always looking for the complete performance – expressed a tinge of disappointment after his side did not go on to make the score line even more emphatic!
Skinner said: “Our second goal – scored by Darren Lough – gave us breathing space and after that we really put our foot on the gas. We ended up scoring three but I was a little bit disappointed that we didn’t go on to make it five or six. However we’ll take a 3-0 win at a tough place like Redcar because they are a good side and not many teams will come here and win.”
Dan Maguire fired Ashington into an early lead with Darren Lough and substitute Lee Mason adding the others: “I just thought from the first whistle that we looked like we were going to be at it,” he added, “We started really brightly and within the first minute we got Jordan Summerly in wide left and he put a great ball across the face of the goal. We then scored a fantastic first goal with Dan Maguire doing what he does best, twisting and turning and cutting inside before he’s bent the ball into the far corner. For the first 20-25 minutes I thought we were in complete control then we lost our way a little bit. Sometimes in games you have too much of the ball in good areas and instead of players continuing to do what’s working, they decide that they will try to over complicate things and for 15 minutes it became a bit of a game whereby we didn’t play as well as we had started.”
He continued: “To be fair, we didn’t have a lot to say to the lads in the dressing room and second half we pretty much dominated the game – apart from one pivotal moment when our ‘keeper Karl Dryden has made a double save. Obviously they (Redcar Athletic) have had a player red carded which is always difficult – but it’s equally as difficult to play against ten men as sometimes the dismissal can galvanise a team. However, after the sending off, I thought for about five minutes that we were very good in what we did. We kept the ball for long periods and took the sting out of the game and made Redcar have to move from side to side and made them have to chase it (the ball) and basically what you are psychologically doing is telling the opposition that it’s going to be a long second half!”
He went on: “Now we’ll dust ourselves down, train this week and prepare properly for our home game against Newton Aycliffe on Saturday (March 25). Fingers crossed we should be looking at having a full compliment of players including Ryan McKinnon and Adam Johnson who were both unavailable at Redcar.”
Kick off on Saturday is 3pm.