Following last week’s commendable away performance against high flying Seaton Carew in the semi-final of the Shipowners Cup it was a case of ‘after the Lord Mayor’s Show’ for Windscale.
They had also put together two consecutive Wearside League victories but couldn’t make it three as they went down to a 2-1 home defeat to strugglers Brandon.
The visitors appeared to be in a state of disarray, arriving in dribs and drabs, their full squad available only 10 minutes prior to the scheduled kick-of time.
It was disappointing that the Atoms failed to take advantage of this situation and pressurise a team who appeared to be happy to take a point from the fixture.
Due to the prolonged rainfall through the week, the pitch was not conducive to measured build up play.
Windscale were better suited to moving the ball forward quickly but were guilty of labouring their approach work and on many occasions losing possession with poorly judged passes to team-mates.
Travis Fyfe and Andrew Begbie, between them, conjured up the best chance of the half.
A diagonal pass from Begbie put Fyfe through on goal, but the ball slipped away from the attacker as he was preparing his shot on goal.
There were a handful of other promising approaches during the first 45 minutes with Windscale unable to convert any of these, and Brandon were far happier with the 0-0 score line at the interval.
Despite some harsh words during the interval, the performance levels from the Atoms showed little sign of improvement as Brandon took the lead within two minutes of the restart.
Atoms keeper Levi McAdam would have been disappointed with himself, failing to effectively clear a Brandon attack up the pitch, and instead gifted the ball to Nathan Smith who fired home into the top corner.
The scores were level five minutes later with a delicate finish from Jayden Fulton. Receiving a pass 25 yards from goal Fulton lifted the ball over the advancing Brandon keeper Aiden Gill.
It looked from this point that the Atoms would take control of the game, and up their performance levels to take all three points.
This was not the case, as far too often players were guilty of some sloppy passing, losing possession unnecessarily and making it easier for Brandon to contain any Windscale attacks.
As the game was drifting towards a close, Brandon delivered the sucker punch.
The usually reliable McAdam had a moment he will want to forget. He lofted the ball forward only to find the feet of Kane Barron who, after rounding a couple of half challenges lofted the ball back over McAdam’s head into the back of the net.
It was a poor performance all-round by the Atoms, and they will need to improve dramatically as they have a number of difficult away fixtures on the horizon.
These start next week with a return trip to Hartlepool to take on Seaton Carew again, this time in a league fixture.
Hear what manager Stephen Fawcett had to say about the match below:
