McIVOR: “A DRAW WAS THE LEAST WE DESERVED”

By Brian Bennett

Ashington’s assistant manager Liam McIvor looked on as Ryan Wombwell scored a late equaliser to rescue a point for the Colliers from their clash against Sherwood Colliery at Debdale Park on Saturday – and said he thought a draw was the least the Wansbeck side deserved.

Wombwell’s strike – his first goal for the club – took Ashington’s recent run to three wins and two draws from their last six matches and McIvor reiterated what manager Nick Gray said recently – that he thinks the team are heading in the right direction.

McIvor commented: “I thought 100 per cent we were the better team in the second half and a draw was the least we deserved. From the start of the game, we just dropped off a little bit and made them look good by allowing them play. If you give any player time on the ball they’ll kill you and we just gave their two midfielders time on the ball to pick passes out and they created a couple of good chances but thankfully for us they missed. For the first 35 minutes we didn’t get going then when Scott Lowery unfortunately got injured and we changed our shape, we looked a different team.”

Ashington went in at the break trailing to a penalty which was converted by Sherwood’s Carter Widdowson but McIvor was always optimistic: “The message at half time was to keep going because we have got quality in the squad and I knew we would create chances. We hit the woodwork twice and I think we’ve created enough (chances) today than we have done in the last three of four games but we just need that extra bit of quality in the final third.”

He continued: “We have travelled to both Grimsby and Sherwood in four days – in total a round trip of over 600 miles – and have come away with four points out of six and I would have settled for that beforehand. It was important not to lose today especially after winning on Wednesday and we’re heading in the right direction. However the message to the lads is simple – if we want to be a good team we have got to kill teams off like we should have done today.”

McIvor added that the squad will train twice this week ahead of Saturday’s away clash against Stocksbridge Park Steels (January 25).