Saturday 27th March 2004 – Midland Football AllianceRocester 0 Oldbury United 0 (Abandoned after 41 minutes)Rocester’s hopes of extending their lead at the top of the Midland Alliance came to an abrupt end after just 41 minutes of this game against old rivals Oldbury United when the visitors’ Nathan Pulisciano suffered a horrific broken leg injury following a flying tackle on Rocester’s Kevin Milward, who was lucky to escape unscathed. The distress caused to some of his team mates at the sight of the injury and the fact that Pulisciano had to be treated on the touchline where the incident occurred for some considerable time by a local para-medic, who arrived within minutes, before an ambulance appeared on the scene led referee Mr. D. Naylor to abandon the game after consulting both managers and officials of both clubs. Up to the abandonment there had been little to choose between the two sides with Rocester being unable to shake off the close marking of the Oldbury team and never managing a shot at the visitors’ goal. Oldbury similarly found little success in penetrating a solid Rocester defence but did manage to test ‘keeper Paul McGing on a couple of occasions and came close to snatching the lead after 35 minutes when a long range free kick found Tony Robinson in the Rocester penalty area but his header drifted wide of the left hand post. The only consolation for Rocester was that both of their closest rivals, Studley and Stratford Town, suffered narrow defeats to keep the Romans in pole position in the final run-in towards the league title. Rocester: McGing; P.Ede; Bostock; Skelton; Heaney; Holland; Milward; Marlowe; Mitchell; McMahon; Berks. Subs not used: Colclough; Hewitt; Reynolds; M.Ede; Froggatt. Oldbury: Cudby; Keight; Watson; Pierpoint; Wilkinson; Lowry; Taylor; Blake; Robinson; Harvey; Pulisciano. Subs not used: Smith; Edmunds; Edge; Hampson; Ruddock. Referee: Mr. D. Naylor (Sutton-in-Ashfield) Attendance: 108 |