Morecambe 2 Great Harwood 3 THE Lancashire ATS Trophy will not be returning to Christie Park this season after an embarrassing cup exit at the hands of a lower division side.
The silverware slipped away in extra time when Shrimps keeper Andy Banks fumbled a deep ball lobbed into the area leaving the predatory Andy Whittaker to fire in the winner.
Throughout the match Morecambe were were always chasing the game and their below par performance is far from ideal for this weekend's FA Trophy tie at Bradford Park Avenue.
The Unibond first division side were determined and well organised and with the atrocious weather conditions playing a part the beautiful game was unlikely to flourish.
Great Harwood took the lead in the 18th minute when a hopeful free kick connected with an unmarked Paul Brown. From then on it was hard going with Harwood building a ten man defence.
It took Morecambe over 40 minutes of play to get back on level terms, John Norman heading in a cross from Michael Knowles, but slack defending by Jamie Udall saw Bursnell pick up a loose ball and run on goal to fire past Banks.
Another telling cross by Knowles was headed in by Healy to level the scores nine minutes from time and, as the game went into extra time, a second bookable offence by Harwood's Lang saw him sent off.
Morecambe piled on the pressure to finish off the minnows but their keeper was in inspirational form and, to the amazement of everyone at Christie Park, Whittaker's late goal gave the visitors a memorable victory.
Team: Banks, Knowles, Annan (Shirley) Udall, Lavelle, Burns (Grimshaw) Monk, Healey, Ceralo, Norman (McCluskie) Leaver.
Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
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