Mark Robinson was delighted to see Marske United go a fourth game unbeaten with victory over Ryton and Crawcrook Albion in the Brooks Mileson Memorial League Cup.

The Seasiders sealed progression to the second round with a professional one-goal victory over the Tyneside-outfit.

Charlie Watt dispatched a dead ball inside five minutes to make the difference, though Marske missed a catalogue of opportunities to further the tally during the second half.

The newly-appointed first team coach admitted the score could perhaps have better reflected Marske’s creativity in front of goal.

He praised his players’ effort, and a great start to the game, highlighting a rise in standards following a dire six match losing streak at the beginning of October.

“The message in the dressing room was: ‘can we go and beat them? Can we go on a run?’ The boys have gone and done that tonight.” Mark said.

“As I just said to yourself, I think people will look and think that we’ve only won one-nil, but at the end of the day, it's cup football. You just want to go through to the next round, and we've done that.

“You can see that the lads have set the standards in the last three or four games. 
We wanted to take that into tonight.

“I think the lads have put a real shift in. We were up against it at times. They had to look after themselves, you know? We know what sides from up that way are like, they'll come and make it hard for you.


“That’s why it was really important that we had a good start to the game, which I think we did. I think we had a good few chances in the first five or ten minutes.

“We weren't really happy at halftime. We stopped doing what we were doing in the first five minutes, where we were getting our joy and turning them. 


“We stopped doing that, I'd probably say for thirty minutes before the second half.

“That was the message at halftime. Can we turn them again? And I think we did that. We created a few more chances, and I think it could have been three or four on the night.“

Mark also commented on the heated nature of the contest, particularly as the minutes ticked by and Ryton sought a leveller.

A number of strong challenges resulted in bookings apiece, including for Clayton McDonald, who will now miss next Saturday’s game against North Shields, alongside Tyler Goodman.

“There was some nastiness. I think that was the same on Saturday, and we've come through that too. We warned the lads that that could be the case.” He said.

“No disrespect to them, but we’re a league above. One of the only ways that they could probably beat us is that physical side.


“I thought we matched them for that tonight, without going over the top. Add a bit of magic from Charlie, he's stuck one in the top corner, and like I say, I think it could have been maybe four or five on the night.

“They couldn’t have argued with that.”