by Peter Scherer
Thickening fog brought a premature end to Mickleover’s Boxing Day fixture against Ashton Utd, just after the visitors had taken a 0-3 lead.
Starting line-up: 1-Yusuf Mersin 2-Kieran Brown 3-Jake Bennett 4-Will Atkinson 5-Stefan Galinski 6-Danny Benson 7-Andy Dales 8-Ryan Wilson 9-Tyreace Palmer 10-Gabby Adebambo 11-Marcus Barnes. Subs: Jamie Soule, Curtis Weston, Stuart Beavon, Cieron Keane, Brandon Ferron.
A misty start but on the field it was fairly even. Seven minutes in and Mickleover created their first chance, when Dales cut in from the left, almost finding Palmer and Barnes in the middle.
Two minutes later Mersin was forced into a diving save to his left from a distance shot, giving the visitors their first corner.
Darius Osei hit the post for Ashton after 12 minutes too, with Mersin covering on his right-hand post, but it was out for a goal kick.
Brown had begun to open up the left wing for Sports and after his cross in the 14th minute, Adebambo and Dales combined, before Dales fired his shot over the bar.
Palmer managed to turn defender Baird in the box, who then hauled him back by his shirt to earn the first yellow card. Wilson’s free kick then bounced around in the box, before a follow up shot from the initial clearance was blocked.
Ashton were on the attack too and Mersin had to race off his line after 23 minutes, to block the visitors at close range.
But just after the hour mark, the ball ran loose just outside the Mickleover area. The defence failed to pick it up and James Hardy struck the opening goal into the bottom corner. 0-1.
A minute later and Barnes created his own space, but his distance shot was wide of the goal.
36 minutes in and some more casual defending handed Ashton a second, with Nathan Lowe finding the far corner of Mersin’s goal from the edge of the box, 0-2.
Mickleover’s first change soon followed, with Soule replacing Galinski, so Wilson went to left back and Brown into the middle.
Soule then earned a free kick, as his legs were taken from under him as he turned the defender. Wilson’s kick had keeper Jordan Eastham and the defensive wall beaten, but the ball was agonisingly the wrong side of the right-hand post.
Mickleover finished the half with a short corner that came to nothing, but after a fairly even game overall, they were 0-2 down after defensive errors.
The fog thickened during the half time break and Weston had replaced Atkinson as the teams came out for the second half.
But only a few minutes into the restart Palmer was down injured. “My shoulder popped out,” he confirmed, as he was forced to off and replaced by Beavon.
Mickleover were still pushing forward, but Ashton looked strong on the break. Dales worked hard on the left again to find Soule in the middle, but his shot was blocked again after 50 minutes.
It was becoming difficult to see from one side of the pitch to the other as the temperature began to fall too. But play continued for a while and after 58 minutes Osei ‘s back heel flick made it 0-3 in the visitors favour from close range.
Shortly afterwards the referee consulted with her assistants and skipper’s Dales and Burke and initially play was suspended, before the decision was made to abandon the game with the fog continuing to thicken well into the night.
