Newport County 2 Harrogate Town 1: ‘Despicable’ start leaves sorry Sulphurites staring relegation in the face
“Despicable” was Simon Weaver’s assessment of the way his Harrogate Town players began Saturday’s must-win encounter Newport County.
A 2-1 defeat to their fellow strugglers leaves the Sulphurites staring down the barrel at relegation from the Football League and needing a minor miracle if they are to survive.
Bottom of League Two and four points from safety with just three games left to play, although not mathematically down yet, beating the drop now appears an enormous task.
Even a draw down in South Wales would have done as it would have left Town just a point behind the Exiles, though in truth, Town didn’t even deserve that.
Newport played with far more intensity and intent, and looked like a team who understood the magnitude of the occasion.
A goal down inside eight minutes, Weaver conceded that his side were fortunate not to find themselves further behind during the opening stages.
Captain Jack Evans did manage to draw the visitors level following a tactical re-shuffle, but that was about as good as it was to get for Town, with their manager going on to admit that he was left reeling by the nature of his players’ display in such a crucial encounter.
"To turn out looking that soft in the first 20 minutes, I thought it was despicable to be honest when the fans have travelled a long way,” Weaver said.
"It’s staggering, really. This is a team that has improved massively over the last 15-18 games, so in a game of this magnitude, to get beaten up as we did, will stay with us for a long time.
"I don’t expect to see that first half of football again, whatever league we end up in next year. I don’t expect that first 20 minutes, and people to represent the club in that fashion.
"Newport had us on the back foot and there was no reply of anger. It was a dopey performance, and that is why it hurts so much.
"We needed to get something out of the game, but overall, if I am being rational about it, I do feel that they wanted it more, and deserved to win because of that.”
Town fell behind early on after some poor defending by Cathal Heffernan presented the ball to Ben Lloyd, who opened up the visiting back line with one pass, allowing Nathan Opoku to beat Henry Gray one-on-one.
The Sulphurites responded in the 39th minute when Evans slotted a calm, first-time effort in off the far post following Jacob Slater’s excellent cut-back from close to the left-hand byline.
Harrogate should have taken the lead just moments later, but Ellis Taylor stroked a low effort just the wrong side of the upright after being teed up in a glorious position by Tobias Brenan.
And the game was decided in Newport’s favour 11 minutes into the second period as Joe Thomas’ speculative effort from 25 yards out found the top corner of Gray’s net.
“We knew what to expect, a fast start from them, which we had to stand up to – and we didn’t,” Weaver continued.
"We could have been more than 1-0 down and we had to change our system because Newport were dominating the physical encounters.
"We got a good goal to reply, and it perks everybody up, obviously, and at the start of the second half we thought Newport were there for the taking, but we didn’t do enough and didn’t play enough.
"We’ve lost the game to a fantastic goal, and I thought that Newport deserved that, to be fair.”