Chasetown FC headed into the Christmas break in good spirits following a 4-1 victory over Burscough.
Basement club Burscough made a bright start with leading scorer Mark Beesley and Conor Roberts looking strong in attack while Darren Brookfield tried a volley on six minutes following good work by Paul Williams but his effort went wide.
Chasetown’s first attack of the game in the seventh minute saw them take the lead when a corner from the left by Dave Bridgewater found Gary Birch in space and he had little trouble in heading past keeper Connor Roberts into the empty net.
The Linnets lost Will Jones to a knee injury after 20 minutes as the pace slowed slightly from the frantic early exchanges, substitute Luke Powell heading low under pressure from Chris Slater on 29 minutes but Ryan Price was able to gather.
Jimmy Turner broke up the next Linnets attack before a low corner from Chris Turner saw Danny Murphy’s shot from close range deflected narrowly over the bar for a corner. Williams then saw a shot blocked by Price point blank, Beesley sending the rebound high over the crossbar to conclude the half.
The second half began in similar fashion until in the 53rd minute Jimmy Turner swung in a free kick from the left hand corner and Birch rose above the Linnets defence to head home his and the Scholars’ second.
On 59 minutes the ball was headed down to Brookfield on the edge of the area but his low shot went inches wide of the far post, while the next effort from the visitors saw Beesley force Price into a diving save with Powell skewing the rebound wide.
Price was called into action again on 69 minutes when he plucked a long ball from Joe Comozzi from under his crossbar as the Linnets looked stronger all the time, but on 73 minutes Birch had a chance for his hat-trick but blew it with a tamely-struck shot which bobbled wide.
Seconds later Chasetown had their third when Dean Perrow found a gap in the defence down the right following a fine move by Danny Smith and took the ball round Roberts to make up for Birch’s error and put the Scholars three up.
Things went from bad to worse for Burscough two minutes later when Williams was shown the red card after a confrontation with Birch, but the Linnets did manage to pull one back with nine minutes to go when Powell outpaced Jack Farmer with a good solo run and fired beyond Price into the far corner.
Perrow again teamed up with Smith in the closing minutes and the pair forced Roberts into a cracking save with Phil Quirk blocking another effort as the Scholars fought to make it four, and with two minutes to go they were successful when a Perrow shot was blocked by Roberts and Smith was on hand to net the rebound and put the lid on it for the Scholars.
Boxing Day sees the Scholars make the short trip to Hednesford Town (3pm) before hosting Rushall Olympic on January 2 (3pm).
Chasetown: Price, Farmer, M Branch, Slater, J Turner, Bridgewater, Hands, Stride (c), Birch, Perrow, Wright. Subs: Smith (Wright 72), Westwood (Birch 77), Edwards, Downes (Stride 84), Birt (GK).
Burscough: Connor Roberts, Comozzi, Whitcombe, Murphy, Barnett, Brookfield, Conor Roberts, Williams, Beesley (c), Jones, C Turner. Subs: Quirk (Whitcombe 79), Ellison (GK), Burey, Gornell (C Turner 60), Powell (Jones 20).