A SECOND half double from Connor Cooke and a last minute Sam Eccleston strike gave Sticker a hard-earned three points against troubled Dobwalls at Burngullow on Saturday.

The home side were good value for their win and might have scored several more as Dobwalls, playing without a recognised goalkeeper, ran out of legs on an exacting playing surface.

The visitors had named new signing Andy Sims as their keeper but his mysterious no-show forced them to start with outfield player Kieran Owen between the sticks.

Owen did well in a goalless first half which saw Sticker have the majority of the ball without breaking down a well-drilled visitors’ defence.

And it took until a minute before the hour for the deadlock to be broken with an excellent finish from Cooke after a mix-up in defence.

Dobwalls enjoyed a decent 10-minute spell before Sticker regained control and Cooke’s second quality strike seven minutes from time ensured all three points.

Eccleston’s goal from the last move of the match was the icing on the cake.

Dobwalls boss Kev McCann said: “We were up against it a bit before even arriving with seven regular matchday players unavailable – including first choice keeper Matt Westall again.

“We had a matchday squad of just 14 which included three new signings – Morgan Jones, Owen Howard and goalkeeper Andy Sims – so we knew it would be difficult on a heavy pitch with only three subs available.

“Then, before the game, Sims was nowhere to be seen despite many calls to try to contact him, so I had no choice but to put an outfield player in – with Kieran sacrificing himself – which obviously had a knock-on effect, leaving us down to just two subs.

“The goalkeeper situation seemed to affect my lads with them sitting much deeper than I want – obviously worried about anyone getting in behind – but to their credit we defended really well first half, but kept giving up lots of possession to Sticker.”

He went on: “At half-time we suffered another blow when our top scorer Alex Oshinyemi had to come off after feeling unwell so I had to use another sub and start shifting players out of their normal positions but we carried on defending well for the first 10 minutes.

“The big problem for me all game – especially in the second half – was how we constantly gave the ball away when we did get possession.

“That was going back to how we played at the start of the season, something I thought I’d eradicated but we were so poor with the ball, also not winning second balls which gave Sticker lots of confidence and they deservedly took the lead on the hour.

“We just couldn’t string anything together after that and found ourselves chasing the ball, which as anyone knows just drains your energy – something we couldn’t afford to do with no reinforcements on the bench while Sticker were passing it around very well and eventually scored twice more to take a well deserved win.”

STICKER: Elwell; Whipp, Chafer, Rosevear, Hann (Penrose, 35), Nancarrow, Eccleston, Cooke, Brokenshire, Searle, Guest. Subs: Warren, Handley, Evans, Junior.

DOBWALLS: Owen; Frazer, Neville, Winfield, Ssengengo, Howard, Cable, Causon, Alford, Oshinyemi (Jones, 46), Kemp. Sub not used: Warnes.

Men-of-the-match: Sticker – Connor Cooke; Dobwalls – Kieran Owen.