Carlisle United 2 Newport County 0: By the end, the talk was about the swiftness and youthful swagger of John-Kymani Gordon, whose debut goal will linger warmly in the memory. But let’s be clear. This victory, above all, was about Kristian Dennis.
Carlisle’s top scorer does not produce silky and devastating moments like Gordon’s 57th-minute clincher. But the Blues would be far from fourth place without him.
Indeed, there’s every chance they wouldn’t have won this windswept game without him. What Dennis does is fundamentally important to the outcome of your average League Two game, your average fourth-tier season in fact.
He locates the space when all seems congested, as it often is at this level. He finds the gap when everything is a tangle. You blink, he finishes, and a game has suddenly turned.
At the end of a cold, uninspired first half on Saturday, Dennis produced a classic Dennis moment. First his nostril hairs twitched as the ball bounced and bashed around Newport’s penalty area. Having scented the opportunity, he then put it away with economy and class.
It was premium finishing, high-end centre-forward play. It undersells Dennis to describe him a poacher. You don’t tot up 15 by mid-January simply by lurking.
“I don’t think anybody else in our team could have got that goal,” said Paul Simpson of his leading marksman. “It’s a really good finish – calmness, and an ability to know exactly where the goals are without even looking.”
Dennis’s longest drought this season is four games. He has three goals in United’s last three. Having levered United into a winning position here, he then played a subtly effective role in the moment which was on the lips of most supporters as they took the taste of this latest Brunton Park victory.
Until the 57th minute it had been a challenging debut for their on-loan Crystal Palace teenager; one in which he had shown willing, and competitive and positional discipline, without any opportunity to devastate.
How that transformed when Dennis worked the ball his way and finally the debutant could square up his man. A switch was flicked, a button pressed. Gordon's alive...
He cruised at Newport’s defence, went that way and this, caressed the ball past Joe Day in the visiting goal, and it all looked very accomplished, very…inevitable.
As a first snapshot of Gordon’s potential, the raw traits that Carlisle hope can be adapted from Premier League under-21 football to a League Two promotion race, it was excellent – something to put rival defences on notice as they consider injury-hit United’s restocked range of threats.
His goal had the effect of sending a stubborn Newport side into the middle distance. From there, United applied control and also bedevilled the visitors through Omari Patrick’s high-energy substitute performance.
Before then, it had been difficult. A freezing wind sliced across Brunton Park, and Carlisle, in their first game for a fortnight, were below temperature.
Nothing particularly found its groove in the first 45. Newport’s initial movement was better, their attackers (especially Will Evans and the ever-awkward Offrande Zanzala) a greater threat.
The good thing, in this spell, was that Carlisle did not concede, didn’t allow something loosely through as they had at Doncaster. Zanzala examined Tomas Holy from a tight angle, a couple of headers cleared the bar, a cluster of Mickey Demetriou’s long throws were headed away and a few tame shots entered Holy’s big mitts, and Newport, for their keen pressing and pushing, didn’t appear the deadliest of sets.
United gained ground for Jon Mellish’s move into midfield during the half. It prevented Aaron Wildig from enjoying quite so much room to nimbly orchestrate things for Newport.
Yet it took until the 34th minute for their first shot (from Callum Guy). Things felt rather flat and bitty, the liveliest occupants of the ground at this stage the Partick Thistle fans who had ventured south to join Newport’s supporters after their game at Dundee had been postponed.
United, praise be, then interrupted their merry singing, as Jordan Gibson drifted wide, saw a cross intercepted, Owen Moxon kept it alive and then, via some iffy defensive headers in the gale, it dropped to Dennis. 1-0. Half-time.
And then…a gradual tightening of the grip. Carlisle dealt with some Newport crosses, almost gained a bonus second when a defender deflected a Moxon corner towards his own goal, and then did through Gordon’s showstopper.
Newport’s recent record suggested resilience, but Carlisle, to their credit, gave them few opportunities to underline it. Guy was outstanding in his midfield groundwork, Holy secure in his handling. Evans’ control failed him from one Exiles break, and then Simpson’s introduction of Patrick, for Gordon, put further zip into things.
The substitute, in his 25-minute cameo upon returning from injury, looked ready, looked sharp. As United simmered, he scalded Newport several times with his pace, the best opportunity arising from his work a cut-back which Dennis left for Jack Armer, who was denied by Day.
Graham Coughlan’s side did not give up the chase, and Priestley Farquharson could have glanced them back into it. This was, though, far from a clinical afternoon from the men from south Wales, and after both sides hit the post late on – Gibson for United, Adam Lewis for Newport – there was a sense of certainty about the outcome.
Few things are givens in League Two. To argue otherwise invites complacency, even when fourth take on 18th. Carlisle, though, keep emphasising why they’re in the race. And, as long as Dennis keeps showing he can find space in a phonebox, why they’re a decent bet to stay there.
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