Sunbury Athletic 2-3 Kerria Sports
Damien Shury 41, (a.e.t) Lloyd Marriott (pen) 77, 87,
Paul Johnson 70 Barry Tyson 117
The FA Carlsberg Sunday Cup
First Round
2pm, Sunday 19 October 2008
The Orchard, Bedfont FC
Winning clubs will receive £200 from The FA
Kerria Sports reached the Fourth Round of last season's FA Sunday Cup as "Mayfair United" and their chances of at least matching that achievement were starting to ebb away as Sunbury Athletic took a 2-0 lead with 20 minutes left of Sunday's First Round tie at The Orchard.
But the Morden & District League side had two pacy wingers in Tyrone Roberts and Aaron Hay, and a brave centre-forward in Danny Tanner, and they continued to create scoring opportunities on a regular basis.
The teams had been evenly matched for most of the first half. Lloyd Marriott's volley for the visitors was tipped over by a back-pedalling 'keeper and Damien Shury's blast from close range for Sunbury was pushed round for a corner.
Hay hit a post after menacingly cutting inside on 39 minutes, but Sunbury took the lead two minutes after that. Tom Minton held off two defenders before sliding a killer pass through for Shury to run on and shoot across the 'keeper into the far corner.
The second half belonged to Kerria, with the home defence kept at full stretch. There was a series of goalmouth scrambles in which Kerria seemed fated not to score.
Against the run of play Paul Johnson struck home a low 25-yarder for 2-0 on 70 minutes and Sports must have felt it wasn't going to be their day.
But they still poured forward in numbers and all that relentless pressure, during which shots seemed to be hacked off the line almost every minute, was bound to produce a goal eventually. It arrived on 77 minutes.
One shot on goal, the third or fourth within a few frantic seconds, was handled onto a post and behind. The eagle-eyed referee spotted the offence, sent off the Sunbury defender and awarded a penalty that Marriott slammed into the right-hand corner to give Kerrea a lifeline. Then, with just three minutes left on the clock, Byron Glasgow's free-kick spun in from the left for Marriott to touch in the equaliser from close range.
Both teams had put so much effort into that pulsating second half that the extra half-hour was subdued by comparison. On 117 minutes, with a shootout looming, Marriott's far-post header won a corner and late substitute Barry Tyson fired home through a crowd of players to take Kerria through to Round Two. There was still time for a last-minute penalty, which Marriott put high over the bar following a trip on Hay.
