Altrincham 1 Gateshead 1

Words Harrison Howells Picture Jonathan Moore

The young Robins had just come off a point away against Fylde, where they were solid defensively but lost possession too much for the coaches' liking.

Against Gateshead, in another National League fixture, they aimed to put this right and fix those in-possession problems.

The game started with Alty pressing from the front, with Howells, Denise, Gonzalez and Webster all working hard to force turnovers in the final third of the pitch.

The previous day, they had been working on getting their press right, so this was a great start for the boys.

Gateshead, however, did find some gaps in this press and broke away on a couple of occasions, mainly down their left wing, where they utilised the pace mismatch on that side.

The press from Alty forced Gateshead into a few misplaced passes, and one of them led to the first goal of the game from Howells after being latched on to by the young Robins.

Alty gained some momentum from this and went on to create two or three more chances where the ball was won back far up the pitch and played through to Kyran Webster.

He forced a brilliant save from the Gateshead keeper and was unlucky with a great strike that smashed off the post with the keeper beaten.

The lads knew they would regret these missed chances, and so it proved as a sloppy pass allowed their winger into a one-on-one situation with Oscar Cooper, who dived in and gave away a penalty 10 minutes before half-time.

This was nicely slotted, and the last 10 minutes became frantic and poor on the ball for Alty.

The coaches weren’t particularly happy about this in-possession lapse in concentration and urged more out of the boys, especially those in the attacking positions, who were ordered to concentrate more on holding the ball up.

These instructions were taken on board in the second half, where the hold-up play became much better, particularly up to the hour-mark.

Here we saw our first substitutions of the half, with Webster exiting for Isaac Mannion and Harry Watson leaving for Mo Suwareh.

This allowed Alty to become explosive in wide areas and potentially move the ball a bit quicker in the middle of the pitch. We saw a few chances created by Mannion, where he exploded inside and outside, delivering and setting players up for good chances that weren’t executed.

Gateshead held on well, and a succession of set-pieces led to some really good headed chances for the tall side, which also weren’t put away.

As Gateshead started to get a flow of momentum, the referee unexpectedly red-carded the same winger who won and scored the penalty just before half-time.

You would think Alty could go on to win this now, but Gateshead’s manager demanded they manage the game, and their shape became deep to safeguard a point with a touch of the dark arts by time-wasting as well as defending for their lives.

It just didn’t seem like Altrincham’s day; a few long shots from Raymond, Suwareh and Howells weren’t enough to catch the keeper sleeping, and that seemed to be that.

A much improved second half produced some great chances that weren't put away, and we will look back on that and strive to put things right in next game. A frustrating draw, but we are undefeated in seven games now, which is a great record for the young lads.

Squad on the day: Charlie Noble Tom Whyte Lucas Edwards Kian Gonzalez Kaiden Powell Blyth Bywater Kian Lecky Kyran Webster Remi Raymond Muhammad Suwareh Harry Watson Oscar Cooper Nathan Wood Isaac Mannion Harrison Howells Afernee Denise.