Inspired by the words of his unwell chairman and work boss Craig Wood, Danny Frost played through the pain barrier to produce the greatest performance of his life on the Thursday night Shaw Lane Aquaforce won promotion out of Toolstation NCEL Division One.
This was the final game of Shaw Lane’s 2013/14 campaign and the brief was simple: beat Knaresborough Town to win to book their passage into the NCEL top flight. A point would technically be enough as the Ducks’ goal difference was far superior than third-place Bottesford Town who needed to beat whipping boys Grimsby Borough 20-0 on the Saturday to overtake them. Defeat was unthinkable for Aquaforce, who at the start of the season had been tipped to waltz to the title.
It was not all plain-sailing as a freak Will Lenehan goal put Knaresborough ahead at the beginning of the second half. Instead of panicking, Aquaforce turned it into an all-out siege in Knaresborough’s half with the visitors bombarded by a continuous stream of missiles. The equaliser soon arrived with Frost tapping home after captain Luke Danville’s header hit the crossbar. A Frost penalty then placed them ahead and Craig Elliott’s side led until Fraser Lancaster levelled it in the controversial ninth minute of injury-time. Shaw Lane were still all but up, but confirmation was not received until 48 hours later.
In the latest ‘My Greatest Game’ Frost, affectionally known as ‘The Iceman’ recalls the emotional evening and opens up on his passion for Shaw Lane.
The Teams
Shaw Lane Aquaforce: Green, Stohrer, Fawcus, Patterson, Danville (captain), Cyrus, Reece, Haigh, Kelsey (St Juste 88), Frost (Burgess 76), Whitehouse (Kerr 90). Subs unused: Grace, Swift.
Knaresborough Town: Murau, Thomas, Radcliffe, Duerden (captain), Lenehan, Bradley, Eustance, Wilson (Lancaster 73), Heath, Hobson, Littlefair. Subs unused: Osborne, Stansfield.
Referee: A Beckett
Attendance: 184
“I was really nervous and we didn’t know what to expect as Knaresborough were a decent team going into that game. They were lively up top too. We had been off-form because of the amount of games we had to catch up on because of the pitch problems. We were really tired and it was about one last effort.
“I remember Craig Elliott doing his team-talk. He didn’t try to blow the game up. He simplified things. Woody (owner Craig Wood) wasn’t well at the time and I worked for him at the time for Aquaforce (Plumbing). Because he wasn’t well he wasn’t around work then and for the first time he came into the changing rooms and I was really emotional. He basically said ‘go out and win this game for me’. It was the first time I had seen him in a few weeks. He was brilliant with me personally job-wise, but I just remember him saying ‘get that point or win for me so we can get promoted’. Woody totally inspired me. I didn’t stop running. It was the most I had ever run. I think the whole team was inspired as well.
“There wasn’t much in the game, but it was fairly fast-paced. I think I had a header saved off-the-line. So it was 0-0 at half-time and our game-plan stayed the same. But then they scored at the beginning of the second half.
“We responded by throwing the kitchen sink. Shane Kelsey was having a really good game down the left-side, he was absolutely murdering their right-back. My mindset was every-time the ball came to me was to clip the ball down the channel because he was running him ragged. He got brought down a few times and we started to get free kick after free kick, corner after corner. It was just piling the pressure on more and more. Eventually we scored. Danville hit the crossbar and it was like ping-pong. I usually stand in and around the goalkeeper from a corner and I did start there. The ball got cleared out and I came out, but it went straight back in and ricocheted off a few and bounced to me. I didn’t even get a clean connection, it was more what I call a shin-ting-ton and we were back on track.
“Kelsey then got fouled for the penalty. The pressure I felt was unbearable, but Woody was in my mind. I just kept thinking about his team-talk and saying to myself ‘just win for him, just win it’. It is the most important penalty I have ever taken. Their goalkeeper (Weston Murau) was decent, I’ve never seen him since mind and he was a big fella. The goal just got smaller and I thought I’ve got to hit a corner with a bit of pace. In the end I sent him the other way. The relief was unbelievable.
“I came off after 75 minutes. I was struggling before the game with my foot which I got a whack on. Maybe if it was earlier in the season I’d have been rested. But I was painkiller’d up. If he’d needed me to I would have carried on, but they understandably wanted to shore the defence up to see it out. Obviously Knaresborough did score in the 99th minute and we were a bit deflated afterwards because we technically hadn’t won promotion. There was no trophy and obviously conceding a 99th minute equaliser was a bit of a kick up the bottom. We didn’t really celebrate until we went out as a team around Rotherham. When we got in the changing rooms, Craig Elliott just said ‘don’t be deflated, we have done what we set out to do’. We certainly didn’t have a parade on the field because half of the crowd probably didn’t want us to go up.
“I was there from the beginning with Aquaforce when they were a Sunday side and when we went into NCEL there was all the expectation because people were saying we were chucking silly money about which wasn’t true. When we went into the NCEL, I don’t mind saying to people that I was on £50. People think it was £150, £300, but it wasn’t.
“So there was always that pressure in every game. There was a lot of hate and jealously. I remember one game where we lost to Emley and I know Worsbrough enjoyed beating us, but it was like they had won the FA Cup. They were banging on the changing room walls and doors. I always said ‘let them do, just don’t forget it’ so when you play them again you remember what it felt like.
“It filtered from the (Sheffield & Hallamshire) County Senior League to be honest. I know a lot got put in the Barnsley Chronicle, but we probably turned out to be one of the most hated Non League teams going. People say we didn’t have a fan-base, but for a lot of games, especially in midweek, we got big crowds because loads of local people came hoping to see us lose. Don’t get me wrong, we had a lot of great volunteers who followed us all over, but they weren’t in big numbers.
“At the start of that season, Simon Houghton was the manager and we had a good strong squad. Everything was going well initially, but we had a blip after Christmas and Simon left. I was gutted for him.
“Craig Elliott came in and stuck by me and I went on a decent run of form. I think previously we had maybe overplayed things on pitches that weren’t too great and when Craig came in we took more of a route one option so we could play in the opposition’s half and it helped us massively. He still brought new players like Gary Stohrer, Danny Patterson and Shane Kelsey, but we went on a winning run which took us into the final week of the season with two games left against Hemsworth and Knaresborough on the Tuesday and Thursday.
“We needed five points to guarantee promotion and four to win it on goal-difference. Six points would have made us champions over Cleethorpes. Anything less and Bottesford could have gone up.
“When we played Hemsworth it looked like we had blown and I remember it well. We were 2-0 up and a couple of moments of madness and Hemsworth got their peckers up. A penalty on the hour made it 3-2 to them and I was like ‘wow what has happened here’. But deep into injury-time we got the equaliser. I remember making a run in behind when a ball got clipped in from the left and I think it was actually over-hit, but Andy Hart headed it past his own goalkeeper to give us a life-line for the Thursday night. You have to have lucky moments like that in a season, although if Andy Hart hadn’t scored that own goal, I don’t think we would have gone up that year. I even know the goalkeeper Jamie Oddy. He always likes to give me some hammer, but he forgets about that goal.
“We got the point against Knaresborough and that was the first promotion under Craig and he has been a fantastic manager. Everywhere he has gone he has achieved. When I’ve played for him, I’ve wore my heart on my sleeve for him. He was always honest with me and I always knew where I stood with him so I wish him all the best in his career. To be truthfully honest I think he’ll end up getting a Football League job.
“We got promoted again the following season and the club kept progressing. I think everybody has ‘that club’ which they love basically. Shaw Lane is mine. I was part of that club from it being a Sunday team. To me it is devastating there is not a Shaw Lane Non League side for when my son grows up. The memories I’m going to tell him about are about a club that doesn’t exist anymore. It is the same with Ossett Town. I know they are now Ossett United, but I loved Ossett Town as well. I have great memories from there and it is not nice really. I still have all my old tracksuits from Shaw Lane and I look at them and think ‘they were great times’, even the horrible games on a Tuesday night when we were working our way to where the club got to. It is just a shame it is not there anymore. You have to feel for Woody because he put his heart and soul into it.
“I first met Woody in 2010 on a Sunday morning when I played for the New Inn against Aquaforce. The New Inn was mostly the Worsbrough Bridge lads so you had your (Lee) Garside’s and everybody else. I can’t remember what happened to The New Inn, but a couple of us went to the Aquaforce Sunday side. Everybody hated us then as well because people thought we got paid and we weren’t getting a penny.
“But that’s how it all escalated. We knew Woody was serious about moving into Saturday’s and going up the leagues because at work he is always wanting the best. Whatever he says gets done. I look back and think what could have been done differently and I think if the club had got its own ground that the club would be still there now.”
Danny Frost was interviewed by James Grayson
Best times ever and never be repeated I’ve been writing down a few stories how it all started myself dan keep safe