Willington Quay Saints 3 vs 3 Whitburn Athletic

Willington Quay Saints drew a thrilling game at the Barking Dog as Whitburn equalized three times to deny the home side their first win of the season.

After a tight opening twenty minutes it was the Saints who went ahead as striker Gareth Pugh ran onto a Mark Henderson long ball to shrug off his marker and fire a quality left footed strike into the top corner to give the Quay the lead his 3rd goal in 2 games of the new season.

Whitburn were playing some nice football and got an equalizer they had deserved as an inswinging corner wasnt dealt with and there defender headed home from 4 yards, in their next attack they nearly took the lead but a long range strike from winger Tijan Kah smashed against the crossbar and away to safety.

Goalkeeper Carl Henderson was forced off with a neck injury and his replacement Phil Doolan was forced into a save straight away as he pulled off a smart save with his legs to deny Whitburn another goal

With Half Time looming the Saints grabbed the lead as Micky Young grabbed his first ever goal for the club cutting inside his man to bend home a perfect right footed shot into the corner with the goalkeeper helpless to stop it his last action of the game as he was subbed at half time due to illness Liam Taylor replacing him.

The second half was barely started when Whitburn made it 2-2 as a cross from the right hand side was missed by the Quay defence and the Whitburn left back sneaked in to slide home another equalizer for the visitors.

The game looked to have petered out as both sides struggled in the heat but with ten minutes left the Quay went ahead once more and with another great goal midfielder Kenny Horsman's brilliant diagonal ball finding Mark Henderson who's bullet header flew into the corner to make it 3-2 keeping up his record of scoring in every season of the Saints history so far.

30 seconds later Whitburn grabbed another leveller as they failed to deal with a routine cross into the box and when the ball fell to Kah he smashed an unstoppable strike into the roof of the net from 18 yards to make it 3-3.

With a minute left Saints Andy Breheny almost won it for the home side as he pounced on a loose ball to turn and strike against the post when he looked destined to score, the final whistle went not long after to end a thrilling game in which both sides had plenty of chances to win.

Next up is the Howdon derby at home to Wallsend Labour Club at the barking dog this Saturday 2.30 kick off