ALNWICK TOWN (St James' Park)

FA VASE 2ND QUALIFYING ROUND, ALNWICK TOWN 5-3 PICKERING TOWN, ATTENDANCE: 50

Today I headed north up the A1 to Northumberland to the town of Alnwick.

Alnwick is famous for it's castle, which was used for the exterior and interior of Hogwarts in the Harry Potter films and also in the very first series of Blackadder.

Anyhow when the draw was made for the FA Vase I hatched "a cunning plan" to get in a cheeky double by also taking in the Women's Super League clash between Sunderland Ladies and Doncaster Belles, which kicked off at 7.30pm.

Northern League Division Two Alnwick Town were taking on Pickering Town of the Northern Counties East Premier League.  Alnwick Town have spent most of their history playing in the Northern Alliance before they became founder members of the Northern League Division Two in 1982 before relegation in 2007. They returned to the Northern League in 2011.

Their ground, St James Park, has been home since 1900. I liked the set up here, especially the old wooden cover behind the goal. I read in issue 152 of Northern Ventures, Northern Gains (the Northern Leagues excellent magazine) that the existing clubhouse and changing rooms will be replaced once the funding is in place. The tea hut behind the goal was also excellent and Alnwick is close enough to the Scottish border to be able to indulge oneself with a scotch pie!

I arrived in the town in plenty of time to "tick off" both 2015 GBG entries, the John Bull Inn and the Tanners Arms. I'm happy to report both were in fine form.

The game was a fine example of a classic cup tie and served to remind me why I love the Vase so much. Alnwick won out in an eight goal thriller, helped in no small part by some clinical finishing at the right moments.

Pickering started the brightest and had an early free kick came back off the outside of the post. On 11 minutes, with their first effort at goal Alnwick scored courtesy of Adam Shanks. 

Pickering continued to have most of the possession but were always vulnerable to the counter attack. They had a chance to equalise, but this time they were denied by the crossbar. It proved costly as on 42 minutes Shanks got his and Alnwick's second.

The second half was just three minutes old when Shanks completed his hat-trick and the tie was seemingly over. Pickering finally got a goal back on the hour through Ryan Cooper but two minutes later Brad McClelland restored Alnwick's two goal advantage.

On 83 minutes Sam Calvert scored to set up a grandstand finish and when Robert Hawkes made it 4-3 on 90 minutes it made things really interesting. With stoppage time to go Pickering threw everyone forward in desperate search of an equaliser but they were once again caught on the break and it was that man Adam Shanks who scored his fourth goal of the game with the final kick of the game.

Credit to both teams for serving up a brilliant game of football.