Game played at Barkingside.

Barkingside 1 – 1 Coggeshall ( Coggeshall won 4-2 on penalties )

Coggeshall Town progressed into the second round of the Essex Senior Cup after a 40 year absence with a fine win at Barkingside.” The Towns” opponents on the night operate at a level higher in The Essex Senior League and were only relegated from Ryman League Division One at the end of last season, so it looked a tough fixture.

Coggeshall arrived at Barkingside to find conditions were very poor with the playing surface in a terrible state which was going to make playing any sort of attractive football almost impossible. Coggeshall made 6 changes to there starting lineup from the weekends win over Bury showing what great strength in depth there is in the squad.

The game started at a brisk pace with both teams working very hard to try and gain the early advantage but the playing surface was making it a scrappy affair. There was chances at both ends with Nnamdi Nwachuku going close on two occasions for Coggeshall, but they also needed two very good saves from Matt Walker to keep Barkingside out at the other end. As the half went on Coggeshall started to dictate the play and were looking the more likely to break the deadlock.” The Town” went close on two more occasions with Edilson Cruz stretching the home teams back line out wide and crossing for first Jordan Palmer and then Matt Southwell to get efforts on goal but the Barkingside keeper saved well. It was against the run of play that Barkingside took the lead after a forward move from Coggeshall broke down which lead to Barkingside breaking away to score with a nice finish from just inside the box. It was harsh on “The Town” as they had been the better side for most of the half but went in a goal down at half time.

Coggeshall came out for the second half very fired up as they looked to get back on level terms and took the game to Barkingside right from the start. Coggeshall created plenty of chances but failed to convert with the Barkingside keeper making lots of good saves, Palmer and Nwachuku both went close and Cruz also hit the woodwork from close range. It was Edilson Cruz who supplied a great cross into the Barkingside area after some good link up play with Danny Scott which a Barkingside player turned into his own net to get ” The Town” back on level terms. With around 15 minutes to go Coggeshall’s task was made harder after Nnamdi Nwachuku was sent off for a second bookable offence leaving the away team with 10 men. Even though they were a man short Coggeshall still kept pressing late on and it looked like there would only be one winner with Barkingside hanging on towards the end. The final whistle went though with the scores level and the match went straight to a penalty shoot out to decide the result.”The Town” went into the shootout full of confidence having won two matches in recent times by penalties including the Border League cup final last season.

They got off to a flying start with Matt Walker saving the first Barkingside penalty diving away to his right to make a great stop. Jordan Palmer and Lee Cullen both converted there spot kicks before Barkingside missed the target again, Henri Okosi slotted his kick home for Coggeshall leaving Edilson Cruz to have the chance to win it for ” The Town “, Cruz stepped up confidently and sent a excellent penalty into the top corner to give the keeper no chance and send Coggeshall through to the next round.

It had been a good nights work for the team who had worked extremely hard to get the win.

It was a tough job for anyone to stand out on such a terrible surface but Matt Southwell was excellent in midfield along with Jordan Palmer and Edilson Cruz caused problems all night for the opposition.

The team are back in league action Saturday with a tough trip to Debenham.

Video by Peter Bennett