Abingdon United Football Club N

First Team News

ABINGDON UNITED 1 CINDERFORD TOWN 1

Town gained a valuable point in their fight to pull away from the relegation zone and were only seconds away from taking all three.
The visitors survived early Abingdon pressure with James Organ hitting the Cinderford bar in the sixth minute after a head down by Tom Franklin from a corner.

James Organ Has his shot blocked

A couple of minutes later and John Mills and Ryan Curtin played themselves through the Town defence.
Curtin was sent away after a cutting pass and as the Cinderford keeper hesitated in coming for the ball, he went for goal but his shot was too close to Ben John.
The ball hit the keeper and the pace was taken off the shot and as it rolled goalwards a defender was able to get back and clear it away.
The visitors first shot came on quarter of an hour with Simon Heal firing way over from a distance. Five minutes later and Pete Macklin saw his fierce drive deflected wide.
Mills ran onto a well judged pass inside the area but put his chance straight at Ben John and lacking power it was collected with ease.
Then with three minutes to the break Curtin turned and let fly a tremendous volley from the edge of the area only to be denied by a great flying save from John.
In the 56th minute Lee O’Connor put Town ahead after some slick play gave him time to fire beyond John Beames and into the far side of the goal.
Cinderford’s heads were up and they started taking the game more to Abingdon who were relying more and more on the counter attack.
Pablo Haysham used his speed to outpace the Town defence and laid the ball off to Mills but he struck it wide of the far post.
United’s keeper Beames was hurt as he cleared the ball and was unable to take goal kicks and was hobbling on one leg but still dived to turn away a curling free kick sneaking in at the base of the far post.
The knee ligament injury is likely to put Beames out for the rest of the season.
Cinderford sensed any decent shot would put the game beyond the home side but the Abingdon outfield tightened up to protect their injured stopper.
It looked like Town were going to get that goal as with fifteen minutes left sub Kyle Bassett broke from just inside the United half and raced into the Abingdon area.
Beames came as best he could and stood tall and Bassett hit the ball hard but too close to the goalie and the keeper stretched and got a hand to it to parry it away.

Ryan Curtin has his shot cleared of the line

With a lot of stoppages in the half there was always going to be a bit of added on time and with four minute extra gone, Abingdon took a kick from the left and with the Ref watching the goalmouth for pushing and shoving he missed the ball controlled by a defenders arm and despite strong appeals for a penalty, he allowed play to continue and it looked as though United’s last chance to get a point had gone.

However there was still time for Beames to hop more than jump to tip over a free kick and then in the ninth minute of injury time and 20 seconds from the final whistle, came the equaliser.
Centre back Franklin stayed up front in a last throw of the dice.
He seized on a high ball forward and saw the visiting keeper come off his line.
He went for the lob and judged it to perfection and watched as the ball dropped over the goalie and bounced over the line.
There was no time left for either side to mount another attack before the whistle was blown to end the game.

Team: Beames, Elkins, Weedon, Organ, Franklin, McCalmon, Haysham, Melledew, Mills, Curtin, Dobson

Subs used: Hunt for Dobson (78)

Subs not used: Beechers, Brown, Christodolou, McMahon

Attendance: 63