United rocked by red card (27.11.04)

TEN-MAN Magpies battled hard at York Road on Saturday afternoon, but still suffered a disastrous 2-0 defeat at the hands of fellow strugglers Newport County.
In this quintessential six-pointer, the balance of play was pretty even until feisty forward Craig O'Connor was red-carded on 21 minutes for retaliating with his elbows, after being shoved in the back.
The dismissal was particularly unfortunate as O’Connor had seemed in lively mood, netting from close range in just the seventh minute, only to have his effort ruled out for offside.
Without him, strike partner Simon Patterson was left to plough a lonely and fruitless furrow, and never really troubled Newport’s well organised defence.
However, angered by the referee’s decision, United’s midfield upped their work rate and went on to dominate the rest of the half, while Newport struggled to cash in on their numerical advantage.
With the bit between their teeth, the Magpies swooped forward in wave after wave, but were repeatedly denied by some rugged defending on the edge of the box, with the hot-headed Eddie Duah lucky to escape a red card for a string of bad-tempered challenges on Brendan Gallen.
United’s best chance to break the deadlock fell to man-of-the-match Rob Saunders on 41 minutes, but his spectacular drive from the edge of the box drew an equally spectacular save from County keeper Andy Delve, who stretched up and tipped it up over the bar.
Delve had to dig deep again on the stroke of half-time, when he was sent scrambling at the foot of his left-hand post by a decent shot on the turn by the otherwise ineffectual Patterson.
At the other end, the visitors were restricted to a single chance, as they struggled to escape their own half.
That all changed after the break, however, as tired legs and tired hearts began to take their toll on the Magpies, who were still reeling from last week’s events off the field.
Within eight minutes of the restart Newport were unfortunate to have an extremely good penalty shout turned down, when James Moralee was chopped down from behind on the edge of the six yard box.
The still reckless Duah was sensibly withdrawn from the action on 60 minutes, to avoid an almost certain red card.
His replacement Jonathon Coates made an instant impact, forcing Andy Goldman to tip a goalbound shot round the post.
But the real star of Newport’s show was the troublesome John Phillips, who fired the visitors into the lead on 69 minutes, when he pounced on Gallen’s misdirected crossfield ball, waltzed through a static defence and fired home from 12 yards.
The introduction of Jamie Cook briefly lifted United hearts, with the mercurial midfielder rattling Delve’s crossbar with his first kick of the game.
However, with the clock ticking down, Moralee settled the tie when he scampered away from his marker and beat Andy Goldman with a firm strike from the edge of the box.
The dismissal of Ashley Williams evened things up in the final three minutes, at least in terms of numbers, but it was way too late for United to fight their way back into the game.

SHAPING UP: United defender Chris Elsegood gets forward on a raid into Newport’s half on Saturday. Ref:87209/16