Dublin almost scored a third, five minutes before the break, when he met a cross from Huckerby with a thunderous header but his effort hit the post and rebounded to safety.In the second half, Blackburn had chances to get something out of the game, but the Coventry goalkeeper, Magnus Hedman, saved brilliantly from Kevin Gallacher and the substitute, Martin Dahlin.. Bolton Wanderers 5

Blake 7, Fish 20, Phillips 30, Thompson 70, Holdsworth 79
Crystal Palace 2Gordon 8, Bent 16Attendance: 24,449MANAGERLESS Crystal Palace nevertheless managed to make Bolton pull hard for safety at the Reebok Stadium yesterday. But the pull of continued tenancy of the Premiership, with its glamour and riches, is a magnetism that defies leaden limbs and tired spirits. By overcoming both, Bolton placed the relegation pressure fiercely on Everton in their match at Highbury today.If Bolton could have chosen a team in the perfect situation and the depressed mood to capitulate, in theory it would have been Palace, a club in farcical chaos and already bound for relegation.Atillio Lombardo had been manager until Wednesday when he turned on his television to discover that the chairman, Ron Noades, and absent coach, Ray Lewington, had replaced him.Because of a knee operation, Lewington had not been at a training session for three months So in reality Brian Sparrow chose the team. Alan Suddick played for Newcastle at 17 and won three England under-23 caps. He won the Second Division championship with Newcastle in 1965 and the Anglo Italian Cup with Blackpool in 1971 But he never made it to Wembley Jarrod was offloaded by Sunderland He scored the goal that got Tow Law to the Vase final. But now I’m going to play in a cup final at Wembley, just like him It’s a dream come true.

Some top professionals never get to play there.”Laidler’s present strike partner appreciates that more than most Jarrod Suddick’s father was a professional for 16 years. At 28 he works as a car window fitter on Tyneside, having failed to make the professional grade at Doncaster. On Saturday they will be found beneath the twin towers at Wembley.
The FA Vase was made for clubs like Tow Law Town, mid-table members of the Arnott Insurance Northern League. When they won through to the final last month, beating Taunton Town 5-4 on aggregate, they did so with more than half of the County Durham outpost’s 2,000 population hugging the touchline at Ironworks Road. As a 12-year-old he starred in the Northumberland team that won the National Association of Boys’ Clubs trophy. So did another forward who will be wearing black and white stripes in a Wembley cup final this month.”He is the best player in the world now,” Laidler said of Alan Shearer, whom at one time he even kept out of the county side “Our careers could not have been more different.

The celebrations lasted long in to the night in what is more of a one-street village than a town – a collection of terraced houses and shops strung out along the A68 Glasses were even raised, and not in anger, to Graham Kelly. Peter Quigley, the Tow Law manager, made a point of thanking the Football Association’s chief executive “for giving true players, who turn out on freezing cold nights just for expenses, the opportunity to play at Wembley”.Trevor Laidlaw is particularly grateful for the chance he will get when the Lawyers line up against Tiverton Town, pride of the Screwfix Direct Western League. As secretary, he conducted the negotiations which took the waddling Waddle from the Northern League to Newcastle “We got three instalments of pounds 500,” he recalled Such was the price of a Tow Law starlet back in 1980 These days there is a whole team of stars at Ironworks Road. It was on the sloping pitch at Ironworks Road, the highest football ground in England, that the sparkling talent of the hunched-shouldered Chris Waddle was detected. “He had the same laid-back way,” Bernard Fairbairn recalled. “His style never changed.” Fairbairn has been an official of Tow Law Town for 38 years.

Steve Tobin’s goal compensates for his sending of earlier in the frenetic finale. But a minute later they fall prey to their habitual failing and concede the equaliser. Survival now depends on the last day of the season – Saturday.SaturdayA goal behind after 19 minutes at Hayes Telford meanwhile are about to take the lead at Rushden Leek, astonishingly resilient, equalise before half time But tiredness tells Goals after 63 and 88 minutes condemn them to defeat It matters not Telford have conceded two in a minute They go down. Leek have been bleak, weak and meek this season but now c’est magnifique Amid the euphoria Pejic insists he’s leaving. He couldn’t cope with his players’ baby-sitting arrangements.. AT 1,000 feet above sea level, overlooking Weardale in rural County Durham, Tow Law always has been pretty close to the stars. Between 1888 and 1934 Thomas Espin used a telescope in the vicarage garden there to discover and catalogue some 2,575 celestial bodies.

He was not, however, responsible for finding the most celebrated star unearthed at Tow Law. Lou Macari, an old friend, comes in and asks, given the injury list, if he can make his playing comeback Do not be surprised.FridayStill, it is not over Leek take the lead against high-flying Morecambe. Two cannot get the time off work to travel to Slough, though one of those also has baby-sitting duties at home Pejic confesses that this hurts his professional ethos Perhaps not so much, however, as another lead thrown away. Bertie Biggins gives them the lead on the stroke of half-time and they hold out well The equaliser arrives from a dodgy corner. The protests continue and Steve Tobin disagrees so much that he, too, gets his marching orders. Telford’s win at Southport keeps them in the clear by two points.THURsdayTwo wins from three matches will do it but Pejic is aware of his side’s tendency to go to sleep. Hardly surprising given the schedule – but under Vauxhall Conference regulations the season has to be finished by Saturday unless Leek care to extend it a week by paying the wages of every single contracted player in the league.