King's Lynn 0 Witney Town 0
15th March 1980
AN INTERCEPTION by Mick Wright in the 80th minute set the Linnets up for an attack and his perfect pass sent Paul Chapman away, only for the striker to stumble and allow the ball to be whacked away.In Witney's next attack just a minute later a centre from the left beat everyone.
in the middle and fell to the feet of Terry Jones who looked set to fire in a shot, but he hesitated and then tried to cut inside a tackle and final the ball was again whacked away.
And those incidents exemplify the game as a whole. Two uncompromising defences whilst the forwards did not appear to have an appetite for the game.
Add to this a bitterly cold breeze and a gluey pitch which all helped make it a mediocre match.
A draw for Lynn stopped the rot after three successive defeats while Witney are the league's draw specialists with 14 from 29 games and they played as if it was the limit of their expectations from the visit to The Walks.
Those defeats for Lynn started at a recent mid-week fixture at Witney with a 5-1 reversal and there had been pre-match determination in the Lynn dressing room to exact some revenge.
But on the field there were only glimpses of Linnets' fire and certainly not enough to give Witney undue concern.
And it should have been Witney taking an early lead when a free kick from Clark floated in and Hirons had the goal at his mercy from six yards, but somehow let the hall skid off the top of his head.
On the half-hour Lynn put together their first concerted move through Watts. McManus and Chapman. Getting behind the defence Chapman squared his centre hack and there was W right sliding in, but the hall bounced off a covering defender.
The first half was played too fast and constantly interrupted by petty fouls. Tempers cooled for the second half and the pace dropped quite noticeably, but still neither side could pull this game up.
McManus who had another busy game hit the Bide-netting and Watts tried to emulate the goal he got at Witney, twice going close in the second half.
Richard Johnston who (with Clive Adams) had bottled the centre up, limped off after an hour which meant Wright going back and substitute David Goose having his first outing since a knee injury.
These enforced changes seemed to give Lynn some impetus but a goalless draw always looked inevitable.
Lynn: Ringwood, Rider, Adams, Johnston (sub Goose 61 mins), Wilson; Rudd, Wright, Watts, McManus; Chapman, Wiles.
Witney: Baker; Bailey, Clark. Goodwin, Stokes; Oliver. Merry, Jones, Light, Hirons. McFarlane: sub Symonds.
Referee: R. Jackson (Grantham). Attendance: 205