South West Peninsula League Division One East

Exmouth Town 4 Okehampton Argyle 4

OKEHAMPTON put in a hardworking perform-ance to come away from Exmouth with a share of the spoils, but were disappointed not to take all three points after dominating much of the second half.

Exmouth started the stronger and had a slight edge until half time. In what was an even contest in the first half the home side took the lead on the half hour, when Osborne glanced home a header from Plater's corner.

Argyle responded strongly four minutes later; a throw taken by Colin Marshall led to a beautiful interchange of passes between Marshall, Steve Kinsey and Adam Mortimer resulting in Marshall being set free inside the Exmouth box, where he was brought down by an Exmouth defender. The resulting penalty was fired home by Steve Kinsey to square the match. Five minutes before the break, Exmouth won a free kick 25 yards from the Okehampton goal and Butler's fierce shot came back off the Argyle bar for Plater to head home and restore Exmouth's lead.

Okehampton were forced to rearrange at half-time with Mike Vernon replacing the injured Steve Williams; Stuart Cann moved out of defence into midfield, and Chris Wills came on for an under the weather Matt Mortimer. This only seemed to spur Argyle on and they really took the game to Exmouth.

After five minutes the visitors were level when Adam Mortimer receiving the ball 30 yards out, turned and went on a run that saw him beat four defenders before shooting the ball past the Exmouth keeper for a fantastic goal.

Ten minutes later, Argyle again opened up the Exmouth defence who could not cope with Adam Mortimer's pace; a desperate Exmouth clearance fell to Steve Kinsey on the edge of the box and he buried the ball in the home net to give Argyle the lead.

This was short-lived, however, as the home side hit back strongly and Tom Reilly, who had had a good game in the middle of the Argyle defence, was unfortunate in heading into his own net when trying to cut out a cross.

Back came Argyle when on 78 minutes Adam Mortimer again outpaced the home defence before squaring to Steve Kinsey, whose shot hit the hand of an Exmouth defender. Again Kinsey made certain with the penalty to complete his hat-trick.

Argyle looked as if they would overrun Exmouth at this stage. Mortimer once again broke clear on the right for Argyle before seeing his shot rebound off the home post. But with only three minutes left, Exmouth crossed deep into the Argyle box and the headed clearance fell to Exmouth's Scott Bellamy, who fired home from 16 yards to ensure the points were shared.

This was an exciting and entertaining match and all credit to the Okehampton squad and officials for managing to get to the match in the adverse weather conditions.

One of the players had walked in from a nearby village to catch the minibus as the Dartmoor roads were still impassable.