West Auckland Town 1-4 Guisborough Town

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Guisborough Town continued their fantastic start to the new Northern League season with their second successive win after a thoroughly convincing 4-1 victory at West Auckland on Tuesday night, with Cole Kiernan starring with a superb hat-trick.

The Priorymen continued where they left off at Thornaby at the weekend when Jason Blackburn opened the scoring once again exactly in the 9th minute.

The big target man was played through from wide by skipper JJ Bartliff and Blackburn drove forward into the West Auckland box and struck the ball firmly home into the bottom right corner. A minute earlier West could have gone ahead but Guisborough keeper Will Cowey confirmed his growing stature once again by clearing the ball off the line.

But in the 13 minute it was unlucky for Guisborough as West won a penalty and Arron Thompson scored to make it 1-1 despite a brilliant effort by Cowey to keep the ball out. The Priorymen regained the lead 10 minutes later when Jack Blackford received the ball out on the left and he cut in menacingly only to see his shot saved but Cole Kiernan was on hand to sweep home the rebound for 2-1 to Guisborough.

On 39 minutes West had the ball in the net but it was disallowed for offside but just one minute later Guisborough swept into a 3-1 lead when Blackford again cut in from the wing and his cross found Kiernan who nodded in his second and the Priorymen’s third goal.

Virtually on the stroke of half-time West had a chance to reduce the arrears but a dangerous effort was first of all parried by Cowey in the Guisborough goal and he pounced on the ball to preserve his side’s 3-1 lead as half-time was sounded.

On the hour mark Guisborough surged into a 4-1 lead when Kiernan was fouled and he took the spot kick himself and buried the ball into the bottom left corner. Three minutes later Cowey pulled off a great save from a West flicked effort and in the 71st minute a West header was well saved again by the young 17-year-old Guisborough keeper.

Guisborough continued to dominate play to the final whistle and Town substitute Sam Webster twice went close to adding to his side’s scoring but the game remained at 4- 1 as the final whistle went to bring the curtain down on another really fine performance by the Priorymen.

After the game Guisborough Assistant Manager Paul Crager commented:

West Auckland is always a tough place to come to as I know from my own playing days and before the game I told the lads we had to be aggressive and on the front foot.

At times we had to dig in but I’m absolutely delighted over the result and performance and the lads are absolutely buzzing in the dressing room.

We got ourselves into a good position in the first half by going into a 3-1 lead and in the second half I thought it was a really good team performance by the lads, similar to how they played at Thornaby on Saturday.

We had to ride the storm from West a little bit in the first half but we managed the game really well in the second half. We’ve added great experience with the signing of players like Liam O’Sullivan and the other lads who were already with us have progressed well into this season and overall we’ve had a great start to the season.

We’ve had two difficult away games at two teams who both finished in the top five last season so to come away with two victories reflects very positively on the lads who have done great. We’re particularly pleased with the seven goals we’ve scored in the first two games and both Jason Blackburn and Cole Kiernan have done brilliantly well so far. Cole has scored five so far and could have had six if he’d scored with his second penalty at Thornaby but you can’t ask for anything more from him so far.

Jason has weighed in with two goals in the opening games and we’ve asked him to play a different role this season and he has taken that on board well and deserves his two goals, so all in all this bodes well for the season ahead.

Looking ahead to this coming Saturday, 6 August when Guisborough host Bishop Auckland at the KGV in the Emirates FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round, Paul commented: “Like us, Bishop Auckland have made a good start and no doubt will be fancying their chances against us with some of our former players in their line-up – so it should be a great game and hopefully we’ll get a good crowd in at the KGV, especially with it being an FA Cup game and our first home match of the season.

Finally, Paul had some glowing praise for young Guisborough reserve goalkeeper Will Cowey who has stepped into the breach following the unfortunate shoulder injury to regular keeper Robert Dean. “Will has done great for a 17-year-old kid to come in and play in the Northern League and most of pre-season,” added Paul.

Report: Bill Perfitt