Urchins close in on Wembley dream

HORNCHURCH’S re-markable FA Trophy run continues.

- Craig Stoddart

They upset the odds again, this time beating Darlington in the FA Trophy quarter-finals, meaning for the fifth time this season Mark Stimson’s battlers saw off a side from above them in the pyramid.

Sam Higgins’s second-half penalty earned the win for the Isthmian League Premier side after Liam Nash had put the Urchins ahead to keep their remarkable season alive.

They are now one game from Wembley and, in Mark Stimson, have a manager who has won the competition four times previously.

He said: “We said this was an achievement, to get through to the quarter-finals, so to get through to the semis is way beyond what we were thinking.

“In the end, I think we deserved it because we defended with our heart.