Clitheroe 7-1 Bootle

Magnificent seven as Blues as light up Shawbridge

On a balmy summer’s evening under the Shawbridge lights, Clitheroe were in sensational form, writes Chris Musson.

Both Billy Priestley and Danny Wilkins helped themselves to braces and Richie Baker had a debut he will not forget.
Baker left his mark as early as the eighth minute, when the ball sat up nicely on the edge of the box after a penalty area melee, and he stroked the ball in from distance on the volley.

The lead was doubled on 18 minutes, when Ross Dent was felled by the keeper on the edge of the box and there were few complaints from the visitors when a penalty was awarded. Cole Lonsdale took care of the rest to make it 2-0. Bootle were finding it hard to get hold of the ball and it was no surprise on 30 minutes when Danny Wilkins went on a trademark mazy run to the bye line and crossed it on a sixpence for Billy Priestley to bury.

Six minutes later, it was 4-0 with Wilkins this time the goal scorer as he thumped a piledriver home after excellent skills from the hard working Alex Turner. The waves of attacks kept coming, and in injury time the Blues made it 5-0 when Baker floated in a delicious free kick from the left wing and Priestley was on hand to apply a glancing header to steer the ball beyond the keeper.

The second half threatened to go the same way when Dent added to the lead after just two minutes, when a free kick from Thompson saw the visitor’s defence static and Dent in acres of space as he finished almost apologetically. Shots continued to rain in on the Bootle goal and it was no surprise when Wilkins rifled in his second courtesy of a deflection.
Bootle pulled a goal back after a defensive mix up and that’s how the scored remained, although it was not before Wilkins only just failed to get his hat trick with an outrageous 50 yard lob of the keeper.

Games like this are few and far between, but the performance will have given the lads a huge boost and had the impressive crowd of 422 purring.

Team : Chris Thompson, Gary Stopforth (Mbako Chalashika), Cole Lonsdale, Richie Baker (Joel Mills), Harrison Burke, Billy Priestley, Alex Turner, Danny Wilkins, Sefton Gonzales (c), Ross Dent (Taylor Brickell), Jake Connelly. Subs - Mbako Chalashika, Joel Mills, Taylor Brickell. Not used - Jack Burrows, Conor Gaul.