Curzon Ashton 1 - 1 Hinckley United

I never thought that I’d be re-evaluating Mossley’s game at Chorley quite as quickly as this but this match for the most part made Saturday’s game look like the last four minutes of the Croatia – Turkey game in Euro 2008.

Don't worry, I’m not going to write a huge amount about this game because there isn’t really a lot to mention. So briefly...

The game might have gone on for two hours (plus penalties) but in truth only around five minutes of it could be classed as being any good. Hinckley made the brighter start and if it wasn’t for a strike force that was about as lethal as cress, the game would have been done and dusted before Glynn Barker pounced on an errant back pass to put the home side one up.

Instead of ratcheting up the excitement levels though the goal had the opposite effect and it devolved into a series of tit-for-tat fouls (and trust me there was plenty of tat) until Hinckley equalised through a rather quite superb strike from their left back Franklin – one of only a few on the Leicestershire side to look like a Conference North player.

Extra-time came and went, occasionally even rising to the levels of moderately interesting, but a penalty shoot out always looked like being the thing that would separate the two sides and so it proved to be; Curzon winning 3 – 2 in the shoot-out and on the whole deserving of their place in the next round.

I have done a highlights video however and though the thought of watching Curzon may be anathema to you (especially them winning), it is worth viewing just to see Hinckley's goal. And if you don't fancy doing that there's always the video of that free-kick from the same match.


Or you could watch it on the ITV site instead where it's better quality but has some of the reaction to Hinckley's goal blanked out.