Fantastic result after a shaky first 20 minutes.
Darlington started the match with what seemed like a 4-3-1-2 formation which frankly did not work. Nantwich looked sharper and exploited Darlington's uncertainty in midfield in the first 20 minutes. They should have taken the lead but a one-on-one chance was missed due to excellent goalkeeping by Jamieson.
However a few changes to the midfield set-up and Darlington started to dominate with Turnbull and Portas getting more of the ball and the Darlington number 8 also getting stuck in and winning more of the 50/50 challenges.
Once Darlington scored the first goal it was one-way traffic with Cartman looking very sharp and troubling the Nantwich defence regularly. Thompson and the rest of the midfield dominated once that first goal went in and Nantwich weren't really in it after that.
2-0 up at half time and the second half was a walk in the park for Darlington once the third went in via a penalty. Nantwich heads dropped as expected and Gray made the expected substitutions which allowed some players to get a well-deserved rest.
Jamieson made another fine save from a free kick in the second half but Darlington scored 2 more well-deserved goals, with the Portas goal ending a fine move. It could have been more than 5 in the end, with Armstrong missing an absolute sitter.
At the back Darlington were solid apart from the early phases of the match when the midfield was being overrun. Well-organised, stronger and sharper.
Difficult to pick stand out performers today but Hunter was superb, up and down the right. Solid defensively and also contributed to several Darlington attacks. Cartman also as mentioned above was full of running and had a superb game.
Overall a fantastic performance and a very enjoyable evening.
Back from Nantwich
-
Neil Johnson
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Tue Aug 21, 2012 8:40 pm
- Team Supported: Darlington
Re: Back from Nantwich
About 250 Darlo were there and after some 10 mins of fluent & incisive passing football from Nantwich our team changed the game into more of a physical dogfight. Darlo were then winning first, second and third balls and were able to then set up some good passing play, as Nantwich wilted.
Thommo was throwing himself into effective challenges and Cartman never stopped running. Portas had his best game for weeks and Nowakowski was heading, tackling and passing well.
Others impressed in a great team performance by tackling and covering for each other.
Nantwich's game fell apart as Darlo panicked their tall but poor defence. I suspect that they were very tired from the Halifax cup game efforts, or that they had a few second string players on the field.
Nantwich had nippy wingers, but they lacked pace and guile to get behind our quick and hard working defence.
It was really open season on their goal for the last 30 mins.
3 points gained, clean sheet, 5 goals extra on the goal difference, no yellow cards and a major uplift to confidence to both our players and fans.
Cartman won the bus MOM, with Thommo as runner up.
Thommo was throwing himself into effective challenges and Cartman never stopped running. Portas had his best game for weeks and Nowakowski was heading, tackling and passing well.
Others impressed in a great team performance by tackling and covering for each other.
Nantwich's game fell apart as Darlo panicked their tall but poor defence. I suspect that they were very tired from the Halifax cup game efforts, or that they had a few second string players on the field.
Nantwich had nippy wingers, but they lacked pace and guile to get behind our quick and hard working defence.
It was really open season on their goal for the last 30 mins.
3 points gained, clean sheet, 5 goals extra on the goal difference, no yellow cards and a major uplift to confidence to both our players and fans.
Cartman won the bus MOM, with Thommo as runner up.