Report by Julian Tyley
Bay manager Jay Bates was expecting a hard game at Guisborough on Saturday but could not have imagined how bad a start his team would make, conceding three goals in the first ten minutes.
“We knew when we were coming down it was going to be difficult. We’ve got a depleted squad at the minute with Covid and injuries and suspensions, two suspended today but still there’s no excuses for coming down here and in ten minutes going 3-0 down. It was all over the place. I’ll have to look back and see the goals again, they came that quickly. We didn’t get into our shape. We’ve moved a couple of personnel around today and that didn’t help things.
"But to be perfectly honest after the ten minutes they had in the first half, I thought we coped. Most teams, after a start like that would have been 5 or 6 down by the 90 minutes, but I think credit to the lads, they’ve dug in, they stuck in, they won every battle after that and late on we could even have grabbed the equaliser."
Because of the shortage of numbers, some players had to go into unfamiliar positions, which Jay admitted could have been part of the problem in the first few minutes. “Yes but to be honest we just didn’t come out.” He put Michael Baxter at right back, which was where he played as youngster. “That’s where he grew up, he was always a full back before he moved into a forward position.”
“But there’s no excuses, they broke away three times and scored three goals, caught us out of position.
“Dan (Gladstone) pulled up in the warm up and when he was out there he was still struggling a little bit and he had to come off, so it was lucky for us that we brought a sub keeper down.”
Richie Crawford made his Bay debut playing almost 70 minutes and Jay agreed that he didn’t let anyone down. “He had a good game, he swept well, he came off his line quite quick, he covered the threat that was in behind when they'd scored those three goals, and with crosses he took every opportunity of catching it. His kicking was quite good as well so for Richie to come in like he had to, it wasn’t a bad start.”
Whitley’s confidence started to grow when Michael Scott scored what was his first goal for the club. “Great goal by the skipper” was Jay’s assessment.
“You don’t want half time to come sometimes because we were on top massively before half time. We came out second half and we had a couple of good chances in the first ten minutes. Then the deciding moment when Kyle’s going straight through, putting the ball on to his left foot where he wants it.” He was then brought down on the edge of the box. “Everyone, even their management’s turned round and said that’s a red card and the only person who didn’t think it was a red card was the referee. It was a deliberate foul, deliberate kick of the feet when he was through on goal.”
Michael Baxter’s spectacular goal caught the Guisborough defence by surprise, so did Jay think it was a shot or a cross? “I don’t know what it was, I haven’t asked him! He chopped it, he chopped it again then tried to dink it. I think if you do that there’s an opportunity that it does go in and I’ve seen Baxter score those goals so it might have been a shot but I’m not sure.”
That led to a tense final period of the game with Whitley almost getting back on level terms. “They (Guisborough) were nervous but things just didn’t fall for us in the right areas. You could see that in the last ten minutes where it was bouncing in the box, it bounced up against Meeshi or it wasn’t just falling right for the player. You could see again when we put Jakey (Forster) up in the nine it caused a lot of problems for their defenders.
“But full credit to Guisborough. They’ve come and done their game for the new manager. It’s a great three points for them. I heard them say that it was a great three points to beat Whitley Bay.”
“In this league you can’t give teams three goals start. We don’t make it easy for ourselves at the minute, we nearly did get back level but it wasn’t to be today.”
Because so many players were missing, Jay had to name himself among the substitutes but was relieved he didn’t have to come on. “I think a lot of teams have got this problem at the minute with injuries. You’re having to play Saturday, Tuesday for nearly ten weeks since the start of the season. Squads aren’t big enough to cope with that and people are getting injuries.”
