Nelson coasted into round two of the Lancashire County FA Marsden Trophy with victory over Great Harwood Town.
Nelson dominated two-thirds of the game against their First Division neighbours and thoroughly deserved the win against opponents who were quite clearly short of confidence.Blues signalled their intentions straight from the off, and had two shots just off target in the first five minutes. And within ten minutes they took the lead.
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Further Blues pressure followed, and on 26 minutes Neil Chapman headed a cross from the left towards the bottom hand corner. The keeper really should have done better but could only help fumble the ball over the line.
With ten minutes to go to half-time, Nelson should have sewn the game up. A low shot was spilled by the keeper, and incredibly the follow-up was ballooned onto the bar from six yards, and a second follow-up again struck the crossbar from ten yards out. A third effort was then blazed over the top and the chance was gone.
It looked as though that miss could prove costly as Harwood enjoyed their best spell up to half-time, but although they had plenty of pressure as Nelson sat back, the best chance they had was from a free-kick which deflected off a defender and looped just over the crossbar.
Harwood continued their dominance at the start of the second period, but again rarely threatened Billy Carrington in the Nelson goal, who had a couple of weak shots to tidy up.
Nelson then woke up and started playing like they had done in the first half hour, and the visiting keeper was called upon to make a couple of stops from point blank range.
He could do nothing about Nelson's third though, and though he got something on another Blues shot, Neil Chapman superbly chased the rebound down before it went out for a corner and scored from an acute angle.
Paul Fildes added a fourth with seven minutes remaining as he fired a vicious shot across the keeper into the far right hand corner after the keeper had again blocked an initial shot.
Harwood had not looked like scoring all night, but Eastham did manage to clinch a comedy consolation for them when Carrington's attempted clearance bounced off him and back over the keeper's head.
This weeks results:
Atherton L.R. 3 Blackpool Mechanics 0
Barrow 4 Clitheroe 0
Burscough 8 Holker Old Boys 1
Darwen 0 Atherton Collieries 6
Kendal Town 1 Fleetwood Town 2
Nelson 4 Great Harwood Town 1
Padiham 0 Fairweather United 2 (Wed 10th)
Squires Gate 1 Ramsbottom United 1 (4-5 on penalties)
Outstanding first round ties (due to FA Trophy replays):
Leigh RMI v Marine
Skelmersdale v Lancaster City
Bamber Bridge v Rossendale United
Southport v Bacup Borough
Byes into round two:
Morecambe
Accrington Stanley
Chorley
Radcliffe Borough
