Tunbridge Wells (0) 1 Ince (pen) 90+4
Erith Town (0) 0
Attendance: 229
Admission: £5
Programme: None
Mileage: 34/468
In this topsy-turvy world in which we live, competitive football finally returned on a Tuesday evening with an FA Cup tie. The previous Saturday had seen a pre-season friendly with paying spectators safely negotiated and with the calendar turning over into September, the allowable attendance was raised from 150 to 300. People queued patiently, scanned the QR code with their phones and had their temperature taken as the turnstile control display ticked over to 229. The new normal is here, hopefully not to stay, but for some while to come.
Technology might have been at the forefront at the turnstiles but it took a good old-fashioned hand line marker to satisfy the referee who had decided that the white lines were not visible enough to start the game on time. A 15 minute delay ensued as the lines were repainted before the action got underway.
The game was one of two halves with Tunbridge Wells enjoying the best of the first half, rattling the bar on a couple of occasions before Erith Town dominated the second period. It would be unfair to say that the Wells goal led a charmed life because they defended with their lives but Erith really should have put something on the scoreboard during this period.
The winner came with a 94th minute penalty, given for handball, from substitute Brett Ince but the moment that took Tunbridge Wells through to the next round of the FA Cup certainly came 15 or so minutes previously when a shot, bound for the top corner, was clawed away by Aaron Lee-Wharton, with what can justifiably be described as a world class save.
Erith probably went home feeling a little bit cheated by the result but it was the Wells, with captain Ryan Cheek outstanding in the centre of defence, who banked the £1,125 prize money but also gained the doubtful honour of hosting their bitter adversaries of Beckenham Town in the next round.
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