By Brian Bennett

Ashington’s assistant manager Liam McIvor had a lot of sympathy for his playing squad following their slender 1-0 defeat against promotion chasing Emley AFC at the Fantastic Media Welfare ground on Saturday.

What developed into an evenly contested game in West Yorkshire was settled by a goal after 14 minutes by Emley striker Belchior Rodrigues and McIvor said afterwards: “The lads never stopped throughout. They put a proper shift in, and I feel for them because they deserved something out of that game today.  Emley are a good team – but the score sheet doesn’t lie, does it?

He continued: “Early doors, the lads had to try and adjust to a new formation which was only put onto them today because of the personnel who we had missing. For the first 15 minutes it was a case of the players getting used to it and once they got to grips with it, they did well. We created some good opportunities and their ‘keeper (Declan Lambton) has made a couple of good saves in the first half.”

He added: “The message to the lads at half time was to keep going and to keep believing because when we were popping the ball around we were good. We got in and around them (Emley) and had some good chances in the second half. Jordan Summerly had one effort cleared off the line and then Karl Ross just couldn’t get hold of the rebound.”

He went on: “We’ve got a hard programme over the next few weeks but things are looking promising. Apart from today, the display against Morpeth Town was good and we had a superb 60 minutes against North Ferriby. The lads have just got to keep on believing.”