St Helens Town 2 Silsden 6.

SATURDAY’S game began so well with captain Andy Gillespie latching on to a fine Ste Rigby touchline cross to put Town 1-0 up inside the first minute, writes Glyn Jones.

The home side looked certain to complete a league double over their West Yorkshire visitors, but Silsden surged back and within little more than 20 minutes, they had taken control of this fixture and held a fully-deserved 3-1 lead with goals from William Storrie, two, and Chris Wademan.

Town looked shell-shocked for a while, but tried their best to recover their composure. For the remainder of the first-half, they set about trying to regain a foothold in the game and, although opportunities presented themselves, the ball just would not run their way.

A goalbound header might have trickled in at the left post, but Eddie Pegler tried to make sure of a goal and blasted high over the bar and two good chances were blocked by Silsden boots just when it appeared the visitors’ net looked ready to bulge.

The second period opened with Town in the ascendency and it was quite clear that the next goal would probably be decisive.

It came on 58 minutes, against the run of play, Town on the attack, a loose ball seized upon by Silsden and wingman Kyle Hancock rounded the defenceless Fairchild and buried it.

Rigby managed to pull a goal back for Town five minutes later to make the score 2-4.

It was just one of those days for the home side. Try as hard as they might, little would go right, Town met their match for once and as a frustrating afternoon drew to its inevitable close, substitutes Aaron Davis (85th minute) and Ben Cox (90th) rubbed salt into their wounds with spectacular finishes, to add lustre to Silsden’s deserved victory.

Town are back in action on Thursday at Prescot Cables’ ground, against AFC Blackpool, kick-off at 7.45pm, and play again on Saturday at Sandbach United, 3pm.

Following the news that the Ruskin Drive ground will not now be ready until next season, all postponed matches with the exception of the Whitchurch Alport home game have now been re-arranged and the new dates are as follows.

• Sat, 25 February – Ashton Town (home – Prescot Cables).

• Thu, 9 March – Alsager (H Prescot).

• Thu, 23 March – Chadderton (H Prescot).

• Sat, 15 April – City of Liverpool (H Prescot).