By Liam Price
Stalybridge Celtic tore apart Nantwich Town with a 4-2 win at Bower Fold.
Joe Robbins and Kofi Moore started after good performances off the bench in the win at Wythenshawe Town last weekend.
One of the most anger-inducing trends of this season reared its ugly head again as Stalybridge scored inside the first 3 minutes. A miscommunication at the back meant Jack Irlam had a simple task to slot in the opening goal. He’d scored the killer goal for them in this fixture last season and had now started the killing this time.
Nantwich settled back relatively well and had a couple of half shots and corners to try and regain their footing.
But just after 20 minutes the home side doubled their lead. A floated corner was firmly headed into the top corner by Lewis Raswthorn who was given far too much space but still placed it brilliantly.
They really had clicked into a great rhythm at this point and were playing arguably the best attacking football Nantwich had seen all season. Underpinning that was a sense of determination to right the wrong of the reverse game which was their heaviest defeat of the season when Nantwich beat them 4-0.
Rawsthorn had a header pushed over by Ben Garratt that was arguably easier to score than the one he did net.
Kelvin Mellor then headed over his own crossbar as Celtic threatened again.
Joe Duckworth did get the ball in the net again but was flagged offside to spare the first half hour approaching humiliating levels for Nantwich.
Finally the Dabbers were able to create a chance of their own and it came on the counter, Kai Evans squaring to Tom Pratt who sliced his shot wide.
The hosts nearly scored again, though, when Duckworth brought a good save from Garratt before also holding the rebound.
Nantwich, against any sort of run of play, got on the scoresheet on 36 minutes. A looping free kick by Matty Tweedley dropped for Moore to poke in his 4th goal of the season.
Stalybridge soon reasserted their dominance, however. Rawsthorn was penalised for handball as he tried to break through once more. Then, a header was flicked wide from a corner that Nantwich could not deal with again. Finally, a big scramble in the box saw the ball somehow not forced in with a cross just after fired into the side netting.
It was hard to remember a league game in at least the last couple of years where the Nantwich defence had been so consistently and ruthlessly taken apart. Credit must go to the home side for their part in that, but the warning signs had been there for Nantwich for a while.
Attacking teams can get at this backline whoever is in it; even not very attacking teams can as evidenced by 17 consecutive games without a clean sheet. This is especially true if the full backs are shut out of the game as they were here.
Ben Hockenhull has already proven himself to be a defender who likes to aggressively win the ball high up but he didn’t do this enough and the space he left when it failed left Mellor with big problems. Mellor’s own lack of pace also was exposed in some of those moments and his presence in midfield missed.
If Jon Moran could have made defensive changes he perhaps would have, but there were none on the bench with Paddy Kennedy injured and Troy Bourne suspended.
So all too often it was down to Garratt to bail out the flailing backline, as he did with another save just before half time.
Somehow it was only 2-1 at the break but it didn’t take long in the second period for that to change.
Before that, Evans had his first shot that was pretty simple for Charlie Monks in the home goal.
Hockenhull got himself booked for a late challenge, leading to a free kick in the range of their captain Liam Tongue. He let fly and an unfortunate bounce in the sand-ridden six-yard box took it over the diving Garratt to make it 3-1. This was just 6 minutes into the second half as history repeated again.
3 minutes after that it was 4-1. Rawsthorn once again was played in too easily and Garratt denied him initially. But a dallying Hockenhull was tackled and the ball went straight back to Rawsthorn to tuck away his second. The most abysmal goal of the 4 for Nantwich to concede but it had been a proper number 9’s performance by Rawsthorn.
At 4-1 down after 55 minutes it could have turned into one of Nantwich’s worst league results in a very long time. But a combination of the home side pulling off the gas and some effective Dabbers substitutions meant some amount of dignity could be maintained.
And on 74 minutes Nantwich did get a consolation goal back. Byron Harrison got to the byline and pulled it back to Tweedley whose strike cannoned off the crossbar, dropping to Perry Bircumshaw who fired in on the rebound for his first league goal for Nantwich in almost 2 years.
The Dabbers did keep going and set in an unexpected sense of nervousness into the home team and some supporters too. If they are to get into the play-offs and fight for promotion they will have to cut out that element of their mentality as there wasn’t much reason for it here.
Brandon Newell forced Garratt into one of a couple of saves inside the last 10 minutes as Stalybridge tried to extend the lead again. Garratt had conceded 4 but surely been Nantwich’s best player too, the amount of times he was forced into rushing off his line by the ineptitude of the 10 in front of him was unacceptable.
The two big positives for Nantwich were not really related to the game. Joel Connolly came on in the last 10 minutes for his first appearance since November, and after having had food poisoning on Friday night into the Saturday. It’s that kind of determination that some of his teammates would do well to learn from.
Then, in stoppage time was another return after a much longer wait. Stevie Hewitt badly injured his knee in the FA Trophy win over York City in December 2023. He had to get a second opinion to confirm the injury and then partially fundraise towards the cost of the surgery. After all of that and the subsequent rehab he was back after 462 days, the Nantwich midfield had never been quite the same without him. Shoots of hope on an otherwise miserable day for the Dabbers.
Teams
Stalybridge Celtic: Charlie Monks, Jordan Butterworth, Kyle Brownhill, Charlie Doyle, Sean Tse, Brandon Newell, Jack Irlam (Benni Smailes-Braithwaite, 68), Liam Tongue (C), Lewis Rawsthorn (Elliot Rokka, 68), Joe Duckworth, Max Leonard (Jordan Burton, 68)
Subs not used: Courtney Meppen-Walters, Javid Swaby-Neavin
Goals: Irlam (3), Rawsthorn (21, 55), Tongue (52)
Nantwich Town: Ben Garratt, James Melhado, Perry Bircumshaw, Kelvin Mellor (C), Ben Hockenhull, Matty Tweedley, Kofi Moore (Callum Saunders, 61), Byron Harrison (Joel Connolly, 83), Tom Pratt (Stevie Hewitt, 90+2), Kai Evans, Joe Robbins (Alex Panter, 53)
Goals: Moore (36), Bircumshaw (74)
Attendance: 665