Last minutes raid results in Haringey win over Blues

Haringey Borough 1 Margate 0

By Blue-tinted specs

Haringey Borough 1 Margate 0

The main protagonist in the classic British 1980 gangster film The Long Good Friday is Harold Shand, played by Bob Hoskins.

In the final scene, Shand steps into his chauffeur-driven car only to find it has been commandeered by IRA assassins, and he is driven to his inevitable fate.

There was a similarly horrific final scene for Margate on their own Long Good Friday at Haringey Borough.

Having arguably been the better side for most of this Isthmian League fixture, Haringey’s Samuel Owusu scored in injury time to claim three points for the home team.

This contest pitted 14th versus 16th and, for much of the game, it was exactly what you would expect from such a pairing during the dying embers of the season; even and largely uneventful.

The first decent effort from the visitors came on 20 minutes when a Ben Greenhalgh shot from 25 yards whistled just wide of the goal.

In retaliation, Haringey’s Cypriot star Georgios Aresti had a couple of efforts just miss the target.

The first moment genuinely worthy of applause came at the start of the second half when a cross-field pass found Margate’s Ruben Soares Junior on the left. He cut inside the Haringey full back and unleashed a shot which home keeper Alex Zamani punched away for a corner.

Soares Junior’s pass then put Nathan Wood behind the home defence. Wood tried to find Greenhalgh but the ball went out for a corner.

Soares Junior then set up Yaser Kasim on the edge of the box but he shot over the bar.

With the clock ticking past 90 minutes, a goalless draw looked inevitable but Haringey launched a final raid down the left. The ball was cut back by Aresti to Owusu who shot past Margate keeper Jinadu.