Saturday, March 20, 2004

KIDDERMINSTER Harriers are again looking over their shoulder at the relegation area after a 'rubbish' performance led to a humiliating 4-1 defeat against struggling Macclesfield Town at wind battered Aggborough on Saturday.

Harriers had the chance of going 13 points clear of the dreaded drop zone, but wasted the opportunity by equalling their worst home defeat since taking their place in the Nationwide League Division Three.

Second-from-bottom Macclesfield ripped up the form book by registering only their third away win of the season to leave Jan Molby's men seven points off relegation.

The shock setback took the shine off Harriers' record of four wins in their previous six outings and sparked Molby into calling his side's display 'rubbish'.

The angry Dane said: "The best way to describe it was a rubbish performance against a very average team.

"They did nothing to suggest they should have won 4-1.

"They launched everything as far as they could and they got the breaks. You can say that the conditions were difficult but they played on the same pitch

"I'm sure a few of our players thought they were in the comfort zone and thought 'it's only Macclesfield we're playing' and you can't afford to do that."

Molby said he sensed during Thursday and Friday in training that his players' attitude towards the game was not fully focussed and that the clash was 'an accident waiting to happen'.

The former Liverpool star, however, is determined that Harriers' improved form up to Saturday will not be wasted.

He said: "There's not need to chuck everything away now. We have got to go to Lincoln on Saturday which will be a difficult game, but I still back my side to get enough points to stay in the Third Division."

Harriers were dead and buried by half time when they trailed 3-0 to a Macclesfield outfit that had won just once in their previous ten outings.

With the strong, swirling wind in their favour in the first period the Silkmen took just four minutes to go ahead when Matthew Tipton sent keeper John Danby the wrong way with a penalty kick awarded after he was tripped just inside the area by Mark Yates.

The visitors continued to make the best use of the windy conditions and went 2-0 ahead on 29 minutes. Paul Harsley floated a cross over Craig

Hinton and unmarked Martin Carruthers was on hand to head past helpless Danby.

Eight minutes later it was 3-0 when a neat build up resulted in Harsley scoring with a shot which was deflected into the net by Scott Stamps.

Grim Kidderminster's misery got worse in the 78th minute when Tipton was able to notch his 16th goal of the season.

Harriers finally managed to break through when substitute Scott Rickards scored in the 84th minute for his first goal for the club.

n Kenny Coleman is to undergo an operation in a bid to cure a longstanding stomach problem. The defender has made only 13 appearances this season, his last as a substitute against Woking in the FA Cup on December 6.

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