Northampton ON Chenecks v Barton Town – 17th August 2024

Attendance: 100

Barton Town line up:
Hitchcock, Pulford, W Waudby, Thompson, Papprill, Bulless, T Waudby, Norfolk (C), Broughton, Tait, Aydemir

Barton Town Subs:
Boyd, Houston, Stafford, Moody, Green, Milner

A long trip down to Wellingborough for this game – as the Chenecks share their ground with the local cricket club alternative facilities were required – on a warm sunny day.
There was an early problem for The Swans as it turned out that newly signed Cameron Gray – on work experience from Hull City – wasn’t able to play due to a delay in getting paperwork sorted.

Barton Town were also missing a few regular players; both to injury and being unavailable to play. However as the squad is quite large and has quality players Anthony Bowsley was still able to field a strong team.

There had only been five minutes of play on the clock when Ryan Thompson went down near the halfway line. Play continued with the home side almost scoring but blocked by Finley Pulford. It seemed to take a while before the referee halted play so that Thompson could receive treatment from the physio.

10 minutes in and Tom Waudby skips past the Chenecks defender for a clear run on goal… but drags it wide. With Thompson unable to continue he was subbed by Harry Milner who soon made his presence felt with a cross into the home side’s box. Barton put more pressure onto the attack with a ball narrowly over the crossbar. However, the Chenecks were also pressing and took the lead on 29 mins.

With Fraser Papprill seen to be limping, the second Swans substitution was made with Louis Boyd coming on in Papprill’s stead. With Ali Aydemir going close and forcing a corner, every blue and white shirt seemed to be in the box as the ball came in… and off the head of Jack Bulless for an equaliser!

The game was a pretty hard and physical one with Tom Waudby getting a knonk to the head and with 45 minutes played both teams had players on the ground receiving treatment near the dugouts. The referee had a few extra minutes of play to go and with 48 minutes on the clock the Chenecks scored again.

The second half resumed with another substitution for Barton Town with Ryan Moody coming on to replace Elliot Broughton – another player out with a bad knock. The first 15 minutes of the second period saw some end-to-end but no team was able to take advantage of chances until Barton Town were awarded a penalty which was calmly taken by Tom Waudby to level the scores.

There was a certain amount of “uproar” as The Swans seemed to be clean through on the Chenecks goal but played was halted by the assistant referee’s flag indicating offside! Shortly after a sweetly struck ball from Grant Tait found the back of the net and put The Swans ahead with around 15 minutes left to play.

Unsurprisingly the home side redoubled their efforts with balls being “lumped” into the Barton box looking for any player to get on the end. I think you call it “game management” as Barton made two final substitutions in the closing minutes; Matty Stafford on for Tait and Keegan Green on for Milner.
In true “FA Cup” style the Chenecks keeper was coming forward in an attempt to assist in getting an equaliser but after 8 minutes of added time at the final whistle Baton Town had secured their spot in the draw for the First Round Qualifying.

Barton Town Subs Used:
12′ Thompson off; Milner on
32′ Papprill off; Boyd on
46′ Broughton off; Moodyon
86′ Tait off; Stafford on
90′ Milner off; Green on