Harris header in added time earns 1-0 win over South Park
Supersub Ben Harris scored an incredible winner in the twelfth minute of injury time as Ascot United won 1-0 against South Park (Reigate) on Saturday. The hosts had toiled in the first half before going close on numerous occasions after the break, but Harris’s late header eventually brought down the Racecourse roof.
Lock and Gater return as seasonal games come thick and fast
This was a matchup between two sides who had drawn the opening league game of the season in August’s reverse fixture, and just 48 hours after their Boxing Day fixtures both sought points for very different reasons. The Sparks’ form – defeat in their last three – had seen them tumble to one place above the relegation zone, whereas the home side knew that a win could take them third after a stellar run of ten games without defeat in all competitions.
Manager Jamie Tompkins has rotated his squad imperiously in achieving that, although his hand was somewhat forced on Saturday with Anas Igozouln missing out having taken a knock two days earlier. George Lock and Joe Gater were both recalled to the starting defence – the latter from a two-match suspension – with Aiden Payne-James and Harvey Harry both starting again after impressing on Boxing Day.
Hosts waste chances in mediocre first half
The visitors started with intent but failed to test Mark Scott until the sixteenth minute, when he got down well to parry Vinnie Tume’s low shot away after Andy Somo had played him in.
That was The Sparks’ only decent effort of the half and had come after Ascot’ Harry Grant had fired over and then turned provider with balls over the defence for both Harry and Payne-James; both well-marshalled by the visitors’ defence as they shaped to shoot.
But it was Khalid Simmo who was involved in the hosts’ two best chances; firstly picking out Lock at the far post – he could only head straight at ‘keeper Danny Bracken with 21 minutes played – before himself side-footing into a gleeful Bracken’s arms in the 33rd minute after Harry had helped the ball on following good work from Lock and Connor Holland.
Goalless it remained at the break; the question was whether the home side could find a cutting edge after it.
Incredible second half drama leaves Bracken on the ground
The second half was a dramatic affair, and all of the injury time that followed at the end of it was due to a lengthy delay after Holland and Tume bravely challenged for a high ball in the 51st minute – both cracked heads together – and both would be replaced after ten minutes of treatment.
In and around all the main action, Harry fired over first-time after Simmo had cut the ball back to him in the 65th minute and Josh Edwards headed Grant’s 69th minute cross narrowly over the bar.
At the other end, the visitors enjoyed a brief spell of pressure and Somo dragged wide of the left-hand post before Craig McGee slid the ball through to Callum Corbin, who stabbed wide of the right-hand post; both chances coming inside four minutes after the 75 minute-mark had ticked by.
Five moments of madness
But the first of the main talking points had come earlier in the 50th minute when – somehow – Bracken’s goal survived when Holland’s cross found its way onto the post and up onto the underside of the crossbar via Lock and Harry.
Then, just before The Sparks’ purple patch, Joe Gater met substitute Ollie Mason’s corner only to see Bracken superbly keep out his header, before Goulter’s looping header on the rebound was somehow cleared off the line.
If that wasn’t enough, Bracken added to the drama when he spilt an innocuous cross before somehow recovering to tip Simmo’s low drive away after Ollie Lahtinen-Kalsi had teed him up after latching onto the loose ball.
That came in the 88th minute, but with twelve added minutes signalled from the touchline, there was surely still time for either side to force a winner.
And, it looked for all the world that it would come in the sixth of those minutes when Harris – on for Harry in the 75th minute – wrestled back possession on the right, drilled a low cross to the far post, and Simmo – sliding in – came within a whisker of converting as both he and Bracken collided with the post.
Even the scoreboard’s finished before Ascot!
Incredibly, the hosts’ scoreboard – only able to cope with a time stamp of 99 minutes – had now packed up. But there was to be one last twist in the closing moments of madness.
Mason, only on a substitute for Holland, swung in one last corner in the twelfth of what would eventually be fourteen added minutes, and there was that man – Ben Harris – to do what good strikers do and nod home at the far post; cue another pitchside pile-up from the delirious hosts.
Bracken was crestfallen. Ascot remained on the crest of their wave. And, they would remain in fourth in the table after third-placed Uxbridge scored a later winner of their own against Kingstonian.
But, you can only focus on that within your own control, and the Yellamen continue to do that – just as they showed again that they had the legs – this time to make it eleven games undefeated.
What’s next for Ascot?
The Yellamen remain at home in four days’ time when neighbours Binfield are the visitors in the New Year’s Day derby.
Ascot United: Scott, Lock (Lahtinen-Kalsi 70’), Goulter, Gater, Fraser, Edwards, Simmo, Grant, Holland (Mason 58’), Harry (Harris 75’), Payne-James (Butler 86’). Sub unused: Jones
Entertainment: 4
Reporter’s Star Man: Sean Fraser (Ascot United) / Danny Bracken (South Park + Non League Paper star man)
Away fans (estimate): 5
Image is MOM Sean Fraser in action at Farnham Town on 21st December (shooting-stars.co.uk)