Morpeth Town boss hails 'brilliant' display in Hebburn Town friendly

Morpeth Town boss Craig Lynch has hailed his side for their “brilliant” display in a 2-2 friendly draw with Hebburn Town over the weekend.

The Highwaymen welcomed their National League North opponents to Craik Park on Saturday afternoon, and fell behind early on courtesy of a strike from visiting midfielder Elliot Forbes. Morpeth would equalise just before the half-hour mark thanks to a Hebburn own goal, and would then go on to take the lead through summer signing Harry Gardiner.

The away side eventually hit back via Daniel Moore, but speaking after the final whistle, Lynch admitted that he was over the moon with the performance his team had produced against an opponent two divisions above them.

He said: “It was brilliant today. I thought it was really good. It was just exactly what we wanted. Thanks to Hebburn for coming up and bringing a strong team. We know a lot of the lads, a few of the lads have been here and you know what you're going to get - they're going to want to compete. They're going to want to stay in that league. They've done brilliantly as a club over the last few years, promotions, and then for us it's about regrouping and a bit of a restart, a refresh.

“It's preseason, you don't want to get carried away. Look, I've set the principles of what I want from this season. I feel like it's something that maybe we lacked last year and we've got a squad that really want to buy into it. I think if anyone was here today they could see that.

“Like I said, it's our third preseason game, you can’t get carried away too early, but what I've seen today, I liked a lot of. The two goals we scored, I thought were brilliant. The two goals we conceded, I think they're going to be types of goals that we need to iron out before the season, because I think teams will try and score from them kind of positions. If we get that right, we just need to try and kick on and worry about ourselves.”