Knowle Reach Cup Semi-Finals With Impressive Win Over Gornal

George Revell reports as Knowle dump table-toppers Gornal out of the cup…

Knowle booked their place in the semi-finals of the Birmingham County FA Midweek Floodlit Cup with an impressive 2-1 win over Gornal Athletic at the Garden Walk Stadium.

Gornal sit top of Knowle’s league at the time of writing, but the hosts didn’t show many signs of a side who had only lost on home soil once so far this season.

The Robins limited Gornal to very little on the whole, apart from a brief period at the end of the first half. 

Mitch Botfield emphatically cancelled out George Seeley’s early opener just before half-time, but Knowle did more than enough to win and a second-half goal from MD Shimul made sure they did.

Knowle started brightly and were good value for their lead when top scorer Seeley finished off a delightful looping cross from Talib Copeland in the 13th minute.

Seeley came close to doubling Knowle’s lead two minutes later following a neat cut-back from Odane Barnes, and lively left-winger Copeland rattled the crossbar with a header from the resulting corner.

Barnes was again the architect of another fantastic opportunity midway through the first half, when he would have threaded Copeland into a one-on-one with goalkeeper Reece Francis had it not been for an excellent tackle from defender Declan Bibb on his return to the Gornal XI.

Copeland returned the favour to Barnes on the half-hour mark - and this time it did go in, but the fourth official raised his flag for an offside in the build-up.

The wide man saw another couple of shots blocked in the minutes after the disallowed goal but he played one very casual pass backwards which invited an intense period of Gornal pressure with eight minutes to play until half-time.

Chances were few and far between for the hosts up until this point but Botfield soon made Knowle pay with a low drive into the bottom-left corner in the 40th minute.

Half-time came at just the right time for Knowle, who needed the break to compose themselves so they could build on what was, in the bigger scheme of things, a very good first-half performance.

The second half didn’t have quite as much intensity as the first, but the visitors were still much better than their table-topping opponents.

Knowle regained the advantage in the 65th minute when Copeland’s strike was parried by Gornal goalkeeper Francis before the ball evaded an onrushing player from either team, and substitute Shimul appeared to attempt to block a defensive clearance - but in doing so, the ball bounced off his shin and into the back of the net.

Robins stopper Matt Horton scuffed a goal-kick on the wet ground with 12 minutes to play in Dudley and the ball ended up falling kindly for Brad Ward to shoot, but Horton made up for his mistake by remarkably keeping the forward’s effort out.

The visitors professionally dealt with everything that came their way in the closing stages, and - to the home fans’ frustrations - secured a much more comfortable win than they were expecting.

Joint manager Matt Seeley shared his take after Knowle battled to another hard-fought win…

“It was a classic midweek cup match,” he reflected. “We started the game really well and dominated the first 35 minutes, deservedly going 1-0 up.

“There were arguments at the time, but after watching it back, both goals we scored in the first half (including the one that was ruled out) look onside. It’s fair to say we felt hard done by - especially when Gornal got on top in the last 10 minutes of the first half and grabbed an equaliser.

“In truth, the second half was a poor spectacle,” Matt admitted. “But we earned our luck, found the winner and a place in the semis!

“If you told me (at the start of the season) that at the end of November, we’d be sitting one point off top with a game in hand and in the semis of the cup, I’d have laughed!

“There are so many people who deserve credit - the management team, the staff, the volunteers and of course the players. They have all contributed to the incredible journey we are on.”

Matt summed the whole story up perfectly with one line at the end of his post-match interview…

“We’re loving every minute and long may that continue!”