A cheeky hat-trick by team captain Alex Byrne helped Mossley overcome a stubborn and often times overly physical AFC Liverpool at Altcar Road on Sunday.

Mossley enjoyed the lions share of possession throughout the game but elimentary defensive mistakes allowed the home side to take a 2-1 interval lead.

Liverpool went in front in the 10th minute before Mossley started to create chances of their own with Joe Heap and Andy McKernon causing the homesters plenty of problems down the flanks.

Mossley finally equalised just after the half hour when Byrne bagged the first of his treble after Liverpool had failed to deal with one of a seemingly endless number of Mossley free kicks that had seen several home players yellow carded.

Within three minutes AFC Liverpool were back in front following another defensive error that allowed their centre forward an easy chance.

Mossley, with the breeze and slope in their favour in the second half were able to compress the game in the home side's half and Mossley created several chances before Byrne struck again to equalise from close range ten minutes after the restart.

Within two minutes Mossley were in front for the first time. Antony Dorney broke clear and chipped the advancing keeper and Byrne was on hand to complete his hat-trick, stroking the ball home as it came back off the bar from Dorney's effort.

Mossley were then unlucky to have the again impressive Ben McNamara red carded for a second bookable offence from two hard but marginally mis-timed tackles.

The home side forced a couple of corners with their one man advantage but caused little consternation as Gordon, Alex Clarke, Chesters and McKernon all excelled in defence while Heap and Dorney were both unlucky not to score late in the game as Mossley retained possession well to count the clock down and book a well deserved place in the semi finals of the Premier Division Cup.

Report by Wizard