Garforth Town 3-2 Silsden AFC

Garforth may have felt they had a score to settle after they failed to do themselves justice in the FA Vase exit at Silsden back in September.

After a fairly even start, the Miners started to control the game, but had to wait until a minute before half time to take the lead.
Sinmi Oyebanji has really turned his Garforth career around in recent weeks. From being seen as more of a squad player last season, the skilled wide-man is now putting in stand-out performances and, more importantly, has added an end product to his game.
High on confidence from his last minute equaliser and man-of-the-match award at Armthorpe, Sinmis' heavy involvement in the first half was capped by a delightful top corner finish from a tight angle.

His second was finished with similar aplomb just minutes after the break. It caught the visitors cold, as well as most of the crowd (who'd beat a hasty half time retreat to the bar out of the bitter night air).
This game could have gone in a much less exciting direction just minutes later, had Silsden keeper Daniel Thorpe not smothered an Emmanuel Ajayi chance six yards out. Instead it may have given them hope that the tie was still alive.

When a deflected shot went behind for a corner, Garforth were caught napping by the quick set play, giving Zack Dale all the time he needed to produce a superb curling finish beyond Ben Hunter and put them right back in it.
It cued a spell of pressure that looked set to yield an equaliser until Luke Mangham restored the two goal cushion with a shot that took a nick off the thigh of Joshua Brown on the way. Once again though, Silsden clawed their way back. Joshua Crabtrees' free-kick somehow found it's way through two teams of players and sneaked past Hunter at the far post.

The game see-sawed for the remaining twenty minutes of normal time, with both teams claiming they'd had good penalty appeals waved away.
Silsden had seven minutes of injury time to mount a last assault on the Garforth goal, but Town managed to see it out to the very nervy end.

The last time these teams met at Wheatley Park, Garforths' class of 2011 (the entertainers, or even Ginger Brazil to some!) came out of an incredible County Cup first round tie (see here) as 3-2 winners and this promising new-look class of 2014 have now played their part in another memorable game.

Four time winners Garforth now face a trip to Harrogate Town in what should be a memorable semi-final.