Mossley were extremely unfortunate not to take points from this game against a physically intimidating Ossett Town at Seel Park on Saturday.

It was a sad indictment to modern football that Ossett should take maximum points having made no attempt to play anything remotely resembling passing football as they employed the old fashioned big hoof style. A style that brought them a win they did nothing to deserve.

The visitors were therefore extremely difficult to play against as they constantly gave away fouls, several of which brought yellow cards. In the case of Town winger Chris Ovington and former Mossley centre back Louis Horne, who looked like a fish out of water in an unfamiliar midfield role, they were both lucky not to see red before the game was even half way over.

Ossett’s best chance of the opening period saw Chris Thewlis make a good save to deny Jimmy Eyles who was by far the visitors best player.

Mossley were very unfortunate not to open the scoring when James Blair’s point blank power header was somehow clawed away by former Harrogate RA keeper, the rather eccentric Sam Dobbs.

Mossley were creating plenty of half chances with Welbeck and Richard Bennett both threatening the Ossett goal.

As the second half unfolded Mossley pressed harder and Ossett were restricted to defensive hoof football. However, in a rare foray forward they earned a corner. As Ovington’s flag kick came across the referee considered that Tom Dean had held Eyles and awarded an extremely soft penalty and even yellow carded Dean for the offence. Ossett captain Steven Jeff rifled home the spot kick to give them a shock lead.

Mossley equalised within three minutes. Bennett and Pratt linked well on the left and the latter found Lewis Nightingale approaching the edge of the Ossett box. Nightingale stepped inside a defender and fired a 20 yard effort into the bottom right corner of Dobbs’ goal.

There looked only one likely winner at this point as Mossley pressed for a second goal. Akeister cleared off the line to deny Richard Bennett’s goal-bound header with Dobbs’ defenders under severe pressure as Mossley continued to press.

After completely dominating the half but being unable to break through Ossett’s rugged defending the visitors mounted a rare attack with 84 minutes on the clock. Ovington brought a superb save from Thewlis to earn a corner. Thewlis appeared to be impeded as he attempted to collect at the far post from the flag kick and the ball broke to Chris Wood who forced the ball into the Mossley net.

Shaken but not stirred Mossley went straight on the attack but were constantly thwarted by Ossett simply hoofing the ball away in any direction and the visitors hung on to take three points that their contribution to the game quite simply did not merit.

Report by Wizard