Droylsden 1, Leigh RMI 1
LEIGH RMI took their impressive, undefeated run to 15 games when they drew at Droylsden in the Umbro Trophy.
They are now favourites in tomorrow's replay and an victory would help to erase the memory of RMI's only defeat of the season - 3-1 at the hands of Droylsden on the opening day.
The Railwaymen dominated Saturday's tie and it came as a shock when Droylsden snatched a 30th-minute lead against the run of play.
Walter Nisbett was first to a Colin Haywood corner and his fierce near-post header beat the helpless Dave Felgate.
The Bloods couldn't believe their luck as Chris Shaw had earlier rattled the bar and Paul Wheeler struck a post after rounding former RMI keeper Mike Allison.
Shaw and Wheeler then combined down the right in the 53rd minute for Mick Wallace to crash a right foot drive into the top corner from 20 yards.
Manager Steve Waywellintroduced Tom McKenna in place of Chris Bermingham for the last half hour and he showed some of his early season form that had Droylsden hanging for the replay.
"We had chances to win it near the end, but we must be happy bringing them back to Hilton Park", said Waywell.
"We had a set back before the game when Mark Schofield failed a fitness test, but thankfully Graham Hill was fit enough to return.
"But the confidence in the team is so high that we can interchange players and even when we went a goal behind I still felt that we would get something out of the game;" he added.
Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
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