Latics left moon struck

THAT’S MINE: Athletic winger Chris Taylor attempts to beat his Leyton Orient opponent to the ball.

Athletic 0, Leyton Orient 1
Successive wins against Hartlepool and Bournemouth had led to Athletic’s thoughts of gaining a foothold in the upper echelons of npower League One.

But rather than providing a feast of confidence-enhanced play, Paul Dickov’s men were initially reticent in pressing their out-of-form opponents.

Early initiative was handed over to an O’s side who controlled the tempo with their five-man midfield.

When a rare fleeting chance came the way of subdued Athletic, it quickly disappeared.

Athletic could not say they hadn’t been warned about the route Orient took to their solitary goal.

George Porter ripped Bradley Diallo apart all evening and it was the right-winger’s thrusting run and low centre which turned the game the visitors’ way.

It gave the home fans, experiencing an eighth Boundary Park loss of the league campaign, that too-familiar quicksand feeling.

Taylor smacked a drive wide from the left side of the area and Mvoto almost landed a second goal in eight days as the home side pressed desperately, in gung-ho fashion and without much thought for team shape.

As it was, though, Athletic were again not quite clinical enough to nick a tight encounter.


Full blow-by-blow match report in tonight’s print and e-Chron editions