Kidsgrove Athletic were three minutes away from an impressive win over second place Mossley until Mason Fawns struck a low unstoppable volley to ensure the Tameside club headed back to Manchester with a point.
The grove had taken a 2-1 lead thanks to goals from Kingsley Adu-Gyamfi and a Lewis Bergin penalty as they responded to an Oumar Camara opener after just 11 minutes of play.
Scott Dundas was forced to make a couple of changes to his team with starman Kyle Diskin picking up an injury in training during the week. However, there was some good news for Kidsgrove fans as Josh Thorpe was named on the team sheet, as a substitute, for the first time since December 2020. The defender had picked up a serious Anterior Cruciate Ligament injury during a pre-season friendly against Wolstanton United in July last year and has been on the treatment table since then.
It was probably Mossley who started the better of the two teams as on seven minutes forward Camara got in between the Kidsgrove defence and fired a shot at goal, but it was straight at Ryan Brown. However, there was nothing Brown could do just four minutes later when the Grove defence failed to deal with a Nicky Clee cross and, Camara made no mistake this time around to score his third goal of the season.
That early goal sparked Kidsgrove into life as they came into the game with Jordan Cole and Jake Chadwick having chances from distance, but both of them were to go wide of Thomas Watson’s goal.
The hosts did have the ball in the back of Watson’s goal on 14 minutes when a long ball into the box found Will Saxon, the attacker who has recently returned to the club from Leek Town, steered the ball into the net, but the assistant referee had his flag up for offside. Saxon was then to have another chance on 24 minutes when he burst into the area but, saw his shot well saved by Watson.
Kidsgrove were not to be denied on 25 minutes, when a long free-kick found Bergin at the back post. The defender was on the goal line and he was able to hook the ball back into the danger zone for Adu-Gyamfi to head home his first goal of the season.
The hosts almost went into the break in the lead as Jordan Cole raced through on goal and lobbed Watson, however, like Saxon earlier on in the game, Cole was deemed to be offside and was denied his first goal for the club since returning at the start of the season.
They did go ahead just eight minutes into the second half when Saxon did well to get into the area with Jack Banister on his case, in the end Banister felt the only way to stop the tricky winger was to wrestle him to the ground and that left the referee Harry Warner with no option but to point to the penalty spot. With regular penalty taker Diskin not in the squad, captain Bergin took responsibility, and he struck the penalty to perfection to give Kidsgrove the lead.
From there Kidsgrove should have seen out the game with Saxon seeing his effort well saved by Watson, while Joe Minshall and Aaron Bott seemed to get in each other’s way inside the six-yard box. The ball eventually fell to Bott who put his shot just wide of the post as everyone inside the Autonet Insurance Stadium expected the former Leek Town forward to score his seventh goal of the season.
At the other end of the pitch, Ryan Brown was rarely troubled with the Lilywhite’s best effort seeing Jack Grundy put a header from Clee’s corner just over the crossbar.
However, it’s never over until it’s over and that was the case on 87 minutes when Mossley equalised with a goal that came from out of nowhere. A long ball forward saw the ball fall to Fawns who hit a low half-volley into the bottom corner of Brown’s goal and, despite the keeper’s best efforts he was unable to reach it.
It was a complete sucker punch of a goal that deflated the atmosphere in the Kidsgrove players as they left the pitch knowing that this was a game they should have won based on the chances they had. Grove will be hoping for their first win since late August next Saturday when they visit City of Liverpool in the league because if they can get a run of wins together then they can propel themselves towards the playoffs places in the league table.
After the game, we spoke to Kidsgrove Athletic’s assistant manager Tom Urwin live on the Saturday Sports show.
Kidsgrove Athletic: R.Brown, Minshall, Derbyshire, Bromfield, Lycett, Bergin, Saxon (K.Brown, 85), Chadwick, Cole (Bott, 66), Adu-Gyamfi and Ofosu (Allcock, 57)
Unused subs: Byers and Thorpe
Mossley: Watson, Shepherd, Sass, Clee (Keogh, 63), Dickin, Hickman, Butterworth, Camara, Fawns and Banister (Marsden, 53).
Unused subs: Hartshorne, Killock and Twist.
Attendance: 160
