Ayre and Peel secured their places in this year’s Railway Cup final, but neither did it the easy way.
The Boxing Day final will see the title contenders from the island’s top flight seek to claim the season’s first silverware.
For Peel, they came back from 3-1 down at Corinthians to secure a dramatic 3-4 win.
Joe Middleton made it 1-0 inside two minutes as Dan Simpson split open the Peel defence, before Simpson himself grabbed the second after a dazzling solo run.
After a 17 minute delay for an injury to referee Steph Shaw, the game struggled to get going before the break as Corinthians led 2-0.
However, less than 15 seconds into the second half, Tommy Brown’s strike from distance dragged Peel back into the game, leaving Corinthians stunned by the sudden halving of their lead.
Corinthians would regroup however, with Simpson adding his second to make it 3-1 and seemingly hand control to the home side.
Peel didn’t like that script however and took control of the game, dominating possession and territory, with Brown’s free kick pulling the game back to 3-2.
Despite wave after wave of Peel attack, Corinthians looked to be holding out for the win, but Brown wasn’t done writing his own tale as his corner picked out substitute Aaron Costain, fresh off the bench, who powered home the header to, it seemed, send the game to extra time.
But Peel weren’t done yet and as the game entered added time, a looped volley that seemed destined to drift out of play was pounced on by Dan Pickering, his header snuck in at the near post, sending the Peel side and their fans delirious as they secured an unbelievable 3-4 win.
Walking in the Ayre
Up in Andreas, Shaun Kelly’s late winner saw Ayre beat a dogged Laxey 3-2 to book their own spot in the festival final.
Paul Hatton has the updates from that game.
We will have a roundup of the rest of this weekend’s action late today.
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