Advantage Rovers in Priaulx title race

Rovers were ahead from the 10th minute and never fell behind in the game, but could never properly shake off the most dogged of competitors from Northfield which led to some nervy moments in the last few minutes.

But the majority of the game was anything but nervy. Both teams flew into the fray and from the first meaningful chance Rovers scored a quality goal.

Blair Howitt, given a rare start after James Grundy felt a knee injury would not allow him to manage 90 minutes, was wiped out on halfway but referee Neil Jarvis played a fine advantage and Fin Whitmore fed Max Simpson-Cohen down the Rovers left.

Away from his marker, Simpson-Cohen raced away, cut in, and fired home inside Leroi Riley’s near post with the first of a number of excellent finishes in the game.

Halfway through the half Rovers, marginally the better side at this stage, doubled their advantage. North cleared a dead ball but Rovers won it back in midfield and the ball was played back towards the North goal.

Howitt was offside but played no part, and as everyone else stopped, Tobi Oluborode stepped out of nowhere, took the ball on a couple of paces, and thrashed it past Riley – a superb finish for the centre-back.

But three minutes later North were back in it. Rovers conceded a cheap free kick on the North right. Ryan Lamb’s undoubted dead ball quality was an obvious choice to deliver and his target of Kyle Smith equally so. Smith leapt highest and diverted a backwards header into the top corner.

With Rovers continuing to employ the tactic of soaking up pressure and hitting North on the break, only Archie Drillot’s sliding intervention stopped another home goal as he cut out Whitmore’s cross, but the third could not be stopped for ever.

Charlie Platt won back possession and switched the play to Simpson-Cohen on the left, who sent in an irresistible cross which Sammy Hall headed home from three yards out.

Within 60 seconds Smith had closed the gap again, flicking a through ball on to himself and beating Stevie Balmer to it to poke home for 3-2.

On 39 minutes Balmer, the Rovers stand-in stopper with Adam Bullock unavailable, went full length to deny Jamie Smith and unwittingly start the counter which led to Rovers' fourth.

Colton Fletcher cleared up on the left and Simpson-Cohen produced a perfectly-weighted through ball for Whitmore who beat the offside trap, strode on and buried the chance.

4-2 at the interval and a chance to take a breath, and recollect that these two sides had produced a tight and largely chanceless stalemate at the Soif just seven weeks prior.

Riley saved well from Howitt to keep the deficit at two before North stepped up the pressure and grabbed a real foothold in the Rovers half. The blue-and-whites could just not break out for an extended period which ended with Simon Marley bursting into the box, latching on to a ball from Tom De La Mare and finishing conclusively past Balmer.

Within 60 seconds the Soif faithful were rocked as North drew level.

Lamb swept a deep cross in from just inside the half on the North left, and 25 yards out, Dave Rihoy met a knock-down on the half-volley with the sweetest of strikes, which pinged off the motionless Balmer’s left-hand post and into the other side of the net. In a game of super goals, this was extra-special.

And now the game was on, but within two minutes Whitmore, Rovers’ talisman, had changed the match, and potentially the season, with a solo effort.

Just inside the North half he robbed De La Mare and stormed through wide open spaces in the North defence to beat Riley decisively into the bottom corner.

Nine goals in an hour of endless entertainment, and though the goals dried up, the chances did not.

Rovers soaked up pressure, not always comfortably, but were always a threat on the break and it was a mixture of bad luck and poor judgement from the home side that a further goal did not come.

Whitmore and Hall set up Charlie Platt but Riley blocked well, Whitmore fed on a Drillot error but could not find the opportunity to pull the trigger. Whitmore then hit the bar and Simpson-Cohen drilled home the rebound but was ruled offside.

At the other end Balmer got down low to save well from Rihoy and after a defensive mix-up presented him with a chance 18 yards out, Smith cleared the bar.

Substitute Martin Savident broke clear on Hall’s pass but hit the post, while Joe Alvarez almost capitalised on an unwitting assist from Smith’s nether regions but was too high.

Into injury time Simpson-Cohen fed Whitmore, pictured above, to finish matters but on the stretch, the centre-forward again struck the crossbar.

But once Jarvis, whose intelligent game management contributed to the spectacle almost as much as the players, blew the final whistle, he knew he had done all he could to close his personal Priaulx season and leave his team in the prime position to go on and take the title.