Flanagan’s Onions 2

PHC 0

Two goals from Nathan Peskett gave Flanagan’s Onions victory in a bad-tempered FA Cup quarter-final encounter with PHC Zebras at Goose Gosling Field yesterday.

Peskett brought the game to life by opening the scoring with a sublime half-volley early in the second half, and put the seal on a surprise result by keeping his cool in a one-on-one late on.

Never far from the action, the combative midfielder was also at the centre of one of the game’s flashpoints, when his robust tackle on Diondre Dowling enraged the PHC camp.

The tackle earned Peskett a yellow card, and led to the dismissal of PHC assistant coach Robert Bean, in the 72nd minute, after a prolonged and animated outburst at Martin Wyer, the referee.

Tempers boiled over again in the dying seconds, when Charles Trott, the Zebras substitute, pushed Darren Doolin, the Onions forward, after the ball had gone out of play. Doolin squared up angrily to Trott, prompting players from both sides to congregate in a lengthy session of squabbling and finger-pointing. Wyer, increasingly exasperated, showed yellow cards to both Trott and Doolin.

For all the commotion, Onions were worthy winners over their high-flying opponents, even though they had to withstand a number of scares.

Bottom of the Premier Division and having conceded more than anyone else in the league, Onions used this FA Cup clash to try out a new defensive formation, with a back three of Phil Matthews, Martel Laws and Greg Muir.

“We’ve not been getting results lately, so we wanted to try something different at the back — we changed a few players around,” Mick Ward, the coach, said.

“We were solid defensively and to keep a clean sheet is very pleasing. We used this game as a tester, and as a starting board for the rest of the season. Hopefully we can take this with us into our league games.”

A relatively quiet first half saw few chances at either end. Peskett went just wide when he tried his luck from 25 yards, and Kadeem Abraham pulled one just wide for PHC.

But the game erupted in the 49th minute when Peskett produced a sweet shot from outside the box to send the ball dipping into the bottom corner of the net.

PHC responded quickly, and Naeem Griffith was unlucky to see his header bounce off the top of the bar with Stephen Gould, the goalkeeper, beaten.

Kevin Lambe, the Zebras striker, was then dismayed to see his low shot hit the bottom of Gould’s post after he did well to find space.

Cecoy Robinson, who was at the heart of most of PHC’s good work, drilled over from a decent position in the penalty area, while Gould dived full length to save a shot from Robert Richardson, the substitute.

On the whole, though, there were few scraps for the Zebras forwards thanks to a combination of no-nonsense defending from Laws and Muir and some timely interceptions from Matthews.

In the 88th minute, Onions broke, and Peskett got free of the PHC defence to calmly slot past Jay Smith, the goalkeeper, and ensure the tie was all over — bar the shouting.

Cal Waldron, standing in for Mark Wade as coach for PHC, said: “We didn’t play our best today. We couldn’t find our quality football or get into our rhythm.

“But we’ll get on with the season and now we will focus on the league.”