WHAT a difference a year makes!

Last season, St Helens Town went to new boys Whitchurch and came away with an easy 5-0 win and completed a double with a record 10-0 win four weeks later.

This time around, with a completely new squad, Whitchurch have been among the front runners for promotion all season and took away Town’s unbeaten six-match run with a 3-0 victory, all the goals coming before half-time, ahead of a second period interrupted by fog which rolled on and off the pitch and which caused an early finish, the game being abandoned by Bolton referee Bilal Moosa with around five minutes still to play.

Town began with a number of key players unavailable, including captain Andy Gillespie and brother Alex, Luke Edwards, Ant Whelan ahead of his suspension, Paul Carney who is injured, Michael Chojnicki and Gage Walsh. Keeper Adam Fairchild acquitted himself very well and made some excellent saves in only his second game for the club, Callum Davies deputised for Carney in midfield and Wade Muscart stepped in for Edwards on the wing. Will Threlkeld had another runout up front with Dale Korie-Butler at centre-forward, but they came up against a very well-organised defence, marshalled well by journeyman centre-half Elliot Ledwards. Danny Read, in goal for Whitchurch, always appeared well-positioned to deal with anything that came his way but, in truth, he was never really tested, so effective was the defence in front of him that Town’s only chances came from free-kicks hit straight at the keeper by Threlkeld twice and Korie-Butler in a rather one-sided first half.

The visitors started the brighter, taking the game to Whitchurch, but Mike Blundell’s early shot brought the best out of Fairchild who had to go full stretch to tip it over the bar after 10 minutes.

The home side then began to turn the screw and Town did well to withstand the pressure, relying on the experience of Andy Webster to keep the line intact and Fairchild to pull off a number of last ditch saves, but their luck could only hold out so far and once a long ball cross-field looped over Webster’s head and found Blundell unmarked beyond the far post, the big number 10 stretched his neck and headed over Fairchild and into the opposite corner of his net for a well-placed goal in the 20th minute.

St Helens tried to hit back, but a series of missed passes saw the ball travel half the length of the pitch in the wrong direction and Steve McNichol fed Blundell from the half-way line on 26 minutes and he fired home in spectacular fashion.

Eight minutes on, Town were down and out after Simon Everall scored the third Whitchurch goal from 25 yards, the referee failing to see a clear push in the back on a Town defender earlier in the move.

Nine minutes into the second-half, the referee called a halt to proceedings as fog quickly rolled on to the pitch from the rural end of the ground, making visibility impossible for several minutes and, even after proceedings resumed, the fog came and went.

Town improved in the second period and managed to keep a clean sheet, introducing substitutes Josh Hoult, Alex Worthington and another debutant Stephen Cullen, but the fog returned again with a vengeance and spoiled the rest of the game for player and spectator alike and it was a mercy for all when the whistle went several minutes early with the result already a foregone conclusion.

Town’s next game is at home to Litherland REMYCA on Boxing Day at Prescot Cables, kick-off at 3pm.

The teams have already met twice at Litherland Sports Centre this season, Town winning 2-1 in a League game in August, but Remy gaining revenge 4-2 in a Liverpool Senior Cup match in November.

Remy are currently fourth in the First Division table, St. Helens eleventh.

The final game for 2016 is away to Prestwich Heys on Friday, 30 December at 7.45pm, at Adie Moran Park, Sandgate Road, Whitefield.

Prestwich are just one place above Town and drew 2-2 at Prescot when the teams met on 1st September in something of a bad-tempered affair.

Prior to that, the last meetings between the clubs were in the 1977/78 season, when Town completed a league double over Heys, and there was a two-legged Lancashire Combination League Cup Final between the sides in May 1971 which was won by the Manchester side on a 3-0 aggregate.