Mossley 0 - 1 Salford City

There's a popular saying that states lightning never strikes the same place twice. Unlike most adages though which are built on a modicum of truth, the wisdom this particular one contains is nothing but a myth.

Scientists have spent hundreds, thousands and, likely, millions of pounds proving it to be false, yet they could have got the same result for the measly outlay of £14 - that's all it would have cost them to watch Mossley's last two home league games with Salford.

For the second year in succession The Ammies arrived at Seel Park still searching for their first win of the season and for the second successive year they left with it. The only difference this time being that they they claimed their points of the campaign too and all they needed was a solitary goal.

Its arrival eighteen minutes into the match was the result of a rare moment of quality on what was otherwise a poor afternoon for good football. A slide rule pass sent Adam Morning scampering away down the left wing and after beating Andy Watson not once but twice, the former Mossley winger fired over a cross which was met at full stretch by the head of another ex-Lilywhite, Rhodri Giggs, who directed the ball beyond the reach of Peter Collinge.

A few minutes later a shot by Danny Egan forced Andy Robertson into palming the ball over his crossbar, but other than a couple of half chances that flashed across the face of goal, that was best opportunity Mossley could muster in response to going behind during the opening period.

In fact the Lilywhites were fortunate they weren't facing an even bigger deficit to overcome at the start of the second half after Carl Ruffer grazed the post with an unmarked header from close range just before the interval.

From a Mossley perspective what followed after the break was marginally better than what had preceded it but it still fell some distance short of being enough to rescue the game.

Eight minutes into it Egan once again tested Robertson, this time with a shot from distance that the keeper fumbled, rather than pushed, away for a corner. Over the remainder of the match though Mossley were only able to carve out one more real opening and it came with quarter of an hour left.

Substitute Rob Crank played the ball into the path wing back Ben Richardson and his cross fizzed along the edge of the six yard box to Egan. The forward though, probably not realising just how much time and space he had, swung wildly at the ball and spooned his shot high over the cross bar.

The visitors had the chance to seal the points during a goalmouth scramble in which three shots were blocked in quick succession but a second goal proved unnecessary as Mossley continued to flail, much as they've done all season, in the attacking third of the pitch. The closing stages playing out with the same lack of urgency that had characterised most of their play on the afternoon.

The final whistle was the cue for scenes of celebration from the visiting contingent while those with Mossley's fortunes at heart were left to ponder on another poor week for their side; one in which an early season blip is beginning to resemble a crisis.

To bring this report full circle I'm going to mention another adage that seems pertinent for this particular report and, unlike the lightning one, does contain a lot of truth: if you can't think of anything nice to say, then you shouldn't say anything at all.

So my thoughts on the game and more specifically the performance as a whole are as follows...














And now the closing paragraphs.

With a little over a month of the season gone is it too early to start panicking? Possibly.

But with just one win and five goals scored in nine games, almost thirty players used and now successive defeats to what were the two worst teams in the division form wise, it's hard not to worry about what the next seven months could have in store.