Skinner downbeat after Ashington FA Cup exit

Ashington FC manager Ian Skinner – clearly downbeat after his side had gone out of the FA Cup following a 4-3 defeat by Newcastle Benfield at The dwmedia Stadium on Saturday – said the game changed on a key incident which was not spotted by the match officials.
Action from Ashington v Newcastle Benfield in the FA Cup on Saturday. Picture by Keith Saint.Action from Ashington v Newcastle Benfield in the FA Cup on Saturday. Picture by Keith Saint.
Action from Ashington v Newcastle Benfield in the FA Cup on Saturday. Picture by Keith Saint.

Ashington broke quickly and Ryan McGorrigan raided down the right flank and crossed into the middle for Luke Salmon. However the midfielder was cynically being held back by a Benfield defender – which was missed by the officials. Two minutes later – with Ashington still leading 2-1 - Salmon lost his discipline and was red carded and shortly afterwards. the Lions not only equalised but steamed into a 4-2 lead before central defender Tom Bramley scored a third for the Colliers.

“Obviously my feelings are one of disappointment,” said Skinner afterwards. “The FA Cup is a competition which everybody looks forward to – obviously there’s the history that it’s a national competition plus the Premier League teams come into it in January. The other side to that is there’s a little bit of prize money in terms of helping the coffers of the club and although as losers on the day we get a little bit of reward, it is not as much as for winning.”

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He continued: “The game changed on the 79th minute. I’ve no complaints with Luke Salmon’s red card – you can’t go with a flailing arm. However, my complaints would be about what happened two minutes earlier where Ryan McGorrigan is clean through on the right hand side and he’s squared the ball to Luke Salmon who is being pulled from behind. We didn’t get a free kick and the match officials have missed a key incident -minutes before the incident which changed the game.”

He added: “Luke Salmon has got to hold his hands up - he’s cost us a little bit. We’re winning 2-1 with ten minutes to go - with our backs to wall I may add - because Benfield certainly came out second half and were the better team and created numerous chances. We seem to have an inability to pass the ball in the second half. We kept giving it away which meant we had to harry and chase.

"Then it’s probably in true Ashington fashion that we go 4-2 down then suddenly galvanise ourselves and actually threaten pulling it back to 4-3 and having a couple of half chances.”

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