Latics look adept at avoiding pitfalls

KOREY Smith is all smiles after his goal against Mansfield Town in the FA Cup — but the Athletic skipper has gone 95 appearances without scoring in the league.

ATHLETIC'S recent record against non-league opposition in the FA Cup shows a club adept at side-stepping banana skins.

In the most recent meeting with a club outside of the Football League in 2012, goals from Cristian Montano and Jose Baxter set the seal on a very polished display that saw off Kidderminster Harriers 2-0 on their home Aggborough turf in round one.

Six years earlier, Athletic found themselves playing out back-to-back ties against non-leaguers. First, in round one, there was a tricky test at Kettering to overcome.

GOAL

That game was Sean Gregan's debut for the club - and he marked it with the opening goal. Back came the Poppies, though, levelling through Craig McIlwain before Paul Warne and Neal Trotman made it 3-1. Kettering hit back to level with goals from Zema Abbey and Brett Solkhon and it took a last-gasp Chris Hall goal to book a spot in round two.

That meant a trip to King's Lynn. And it was another tough outing against the Southern League side. Chris Porter headed in to open the scoring in the 10th minute but it was far from plain sailing until Hall, again, got on the score sheet eight minutes from time in a 2-0 triumph in front of a crowd of 5,444.

Eleven years ago, Athletic were drawn to travel to Chasetown. The tiny Midlands Alliance club took a shock lead thanks to a shot from Nick Harrison that hit a post and bounced in off unfortunate goalkeeper Chris Day after 23 minutes, only for David Eyres to level eight minutes later.

The replay of that first-round tie was easily enough overcome, though, as Athletic won 4-0 with Paul Warne's first-half opener added to by goals from Porter (two) and Hall.