Gateshead Football Club
As we prepare to take on Gateshead at the Deva Stadium tonight we reflect on a classic match that portrayed exactly what the FA Cup is all about.
Gateshead and Chester played out a memorable cup tie at a corking pace with quality football from both sides, the outcome a seven goal thriller.
Chester began stronger searching out an opening and the goal their adventurous play deserved came in the 31st minute. Jepson and Trewick went up when Williams flung a high ball into the middle and it seemed to me that the ball finally went into the net off Trewick’s head from Jepson.
Chester found themselves two up some nine minutes later when Bullock hit Gray on the thigh with a vicious shot which cannoned off him to Mason, who slammed it into the net.
Three minutes to the interval Gateshead pulled one back when Baldridge slashed at a ball just inside the area and Keith Griffiths was groping as it smacked the underside of the ball and came down behind him. At half time Jack Collender levelled for Gateshead, snatching Chester’s lead so dramatically from them.
This was to become the most stirring game at the Stadium for some time. Pearson put Chester in front again four minutes after the restart, but Gateshead were not done and levelled again when Ingham came racing inside to ram Brown’s free kick into the net in the 57th minute.
With the minutes ticking away, a replay at Redheugh Park seemed inevitable. Chester had to start again but they were not getting the breaks.
With just two minutes remaining and with my fellow journalists in the press box already preparing their reports for the Sunday newspapers, Foulkes came in on the inside of Dawson to find the net with a low shot to win it for Chester.
Cheers of celebration engulfed the terrages as the crowd gave the Chester players a well deserved standing ovation at the end.
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