DARLINGTON overcame a potential banana skin and more injuries with a 2-1 victory over West Didsbury and Chorlton in the FA Cup.

Quakers had to reshuffle before the game against the North West Counties League side because top scorer Jack Maskell pulled out with a virus on the morning of the game, and then to add to their injury woes, midfielder Will Hatfield and defender Levi Andoh both went off with knocks during the game. As a result, Quakers were perhaps relieved that they didn’t have to face a replay courtesy of Andrew Nelson’s second-half winner.

Manager Steve Watson said: “They gave us a hell of a game, and it was a good game for everybody involved. I’ll always want more, but it was all about getting into the hat for the next round. It was an FA Cup classic, but not a classic match, but it was what the FA Cup is all about. It was a really big day for them, but it was a massive day for us, because the Cup is really important.

“If we’d been more clinical, it could have been 3-1 because at 2-1 anything can happen. It was as tough a game as we expected. We tried to set the lads up with the mentality of giving nothing less than 100 per cent. They had to be 100 per cent focused on getting the job done, especially with the list of injuries that we had. I thought there were plenty of pluses.”

The home side nearly scored in the opening minutes when the lively Jordan Lazenbury forced Pete Jameson into a good save low down at his post, but Quakers should have taken the lead after 13 minutes when Jarrett Rivers got through the middle and struck the post, only for Matty Cornish blazed the rebound over the bar.

Quakers hit the bar on 13 minutes when Rivers put Cameron Salkeld through, but his lob over the keeper came back off the woodwork.

Quakers were dangerous on the counter-attack, and when the home side’s third corner of the game was cleared, Rivers set up Nelson who fired into the side netting.

Quakers took the lead six minutes before half-time when they broke quickly from another West Didsbury corner. Salkeld sent Cornish running through, and he dinked the ball over advancing keeper Oliver Martin.

Quakers hadn’t conceded a goal for five successive matches, but they were picking the ball out of the net a few minutes later, when Lazenbury sprung the offside trap, and beat Peter Jameson with a deflected shot.

After a brief flurry from the Manchester side at the start of the second half, nothing really happened until the 65th minute, when Lazenbury’s pace took him away from the Darlington defence, but Jameson timed his run perfectly to come off his line and win the ball with a great tackle.

But three minutes later, Hatfield managed to probe his way down the right into the box, and pulled the ball back for Nelson, who stroked the ball into the bottom left-hand corner. However, Hatfield pulled up with a hamstring injury, and had to go off.

Didsbury nearly equalised from a corner, but Jameson blocked from Victor Abadaki.

The game opened up as Didsbury looked for an equaliser, and Quakers nearly capitalised again, although full-back Andoh limped off to be replaced by Archie Small.

Nelson dribbled through but fired just wide, and then Martin saved his ten-yard effort. Cornish also curled one over the bar as Quakers saw the game out.