A late goal from Ryan Andrew was enough to see Penzance scrape a hard-fought victory out of an entertaining friendly in front of a large crowd at Borlaise Park on Friday evening. Only ten minutes were left when the substitute ghosted in front his markers to meet a Darryl Richards corner from the right at the near post. He diverted the ball into the roof of the net to give the Magpies a second consecutive pre-season win.
On a gloriously sunny evening, the visitors had started brightest. After a quarter hour, Richards flicked on a Max Everard through ball to Robertas Samnauskas, who cut in from the right and saw his shot cleared off the line. That proved to be the high spot of the opening half though for Penzance, and they owed half-time parity to a trio of fine saves in quick succession from Mikey Flores around the half hour mark. After Kam Collins had tripped Alex Ralph, Pendeen left-back Joe Davies crashed the free-kick toward the far top corner, only to be denied by an acrobatic save. From an almost identical position a few minutes later, midfielder Jimmy England tried his luck. Flores blocked again and was also the equal of Tristan Prowse’s close-range follow-up.
Penzance should have taken the lead straight after the restart after typically industrious work down the left by Cam McCabe, but an unfortunate bobble caused Jacob Trudgeon to scoop the ball over an open goal. Luck changed after 62 minutes when a mistake from Flores went unpunished. The keeper let a shot from prolific Combination scorer Ralph, who has joined Pendeen from Rosudgeon and whose Peninsula League registration Penzance hold, squirm through his grasp and into the net. The effort was, however, chalked off for an offside in the build-up.
The introductions of Kevin Lawrence for Everard, and young Joe Gordon for Samnauskas, freshened things up for the visitors, and resulted in a final push for victory. Player-Coach Lawrence released Richards down the left, and the forward cut inside his marker before clipping a low shot that was pushed behind for a corner. He raced over to take the flag-kick himself and picked out Andrew, who had come on for Alfie Turner just moments before, to give Penzance another confidence-boosting win.
Penzance: Mikey Flores, Alfie Turner (Ryan Andrew 79), Cameron McCabe, Jordan Daniell, Tyler Tonkin, Max Everard (Kevin Lawrence 65), Kam Collins, Silas Sullivan, Darryl Richards, Robertas Samnauskas (Joe Gordon 70), Jacob Trudgeon
Pendeen: Liam Wallis, Shaun Glasspoole, Joe Davies, Justin Nicholls, Glen Carew, Finley Wallis, Ben Chapman, Jimmy England, Owen Prowse, Tristan Prowse, Alex Ralph
Ref: Ken Swift