Another frustrating draw

Jamie Hinchcliffe’s 81st minute equaliser earned the home side a point after Alex Steadman’s impressive strike gave the Nailers the lead in the first half.

This coming after Carlton Town’s 94th minute equaliser against Belper Town in the Nailers previous league fixture.

Steadman gave the Nailers the lead after Wiggins-Thomas slid the ball across to the forward. He skipped past Northwich’s right back before finishing well into the bottom left to give the Nailers a deserved lead.

With the win in sight and only nine minutes to go a piece of sloppy defending by the Nailers gave Hinchcliffe the easiest of finishes as he poked his effort past Rathbone in the Belper goal.

The game was not without controversy. The first question mark of the game came when Matt Richards rounded the Northwich keeper before seemingly being hacked down by the shot stopper.

The attention was then turned towards the referee who waved away the calls from Richards, much to his frustration.

This was followed by several questionable offside decisions that saw some extremely promising attacks ended that could have got themselves a second.

But the biggest opportunity for the Nailers to get a second fell too Ruben Wiggins-Thomas. He blazed past the Northwich defenders with only the keeper to beat; but the striker put his shot straight at the goalkeeper for the easiest of saves.

The Dominic Allen blazed over the crossbar when a half-clearance fell to the Nailers midfielder.

The home side also had chances of their own to get themselves back into the game before their equaliser came.

But the closest that they came was through a free kick from distance that looked rather dangerous. However, Mark Rathbone pulled out an excellent save to maintain his side's lead.

The Northwich pressure continued but they simply couldn’t burst through what looked like a strong Belper defence that on the day was rather makeshift as it featured Michael Armstrong in the centre of the defence and Ben Watkis on the left.

Despite the late equaliser, the Nailers have now gone nine league games without a defeat; five of which coming in the shape of draws.

Attention of the Nailers is now turned to Romulus as the Nailers look for revenge for a 2-1 defeat earlier in the season.