Doncaster Rovers v Scunthorpe United
The Keepmoat Stadium
Coca-Cola Championship - Saturday, April 24, 2010

The Iron Player subscribers can hear live commentary of the whole game with Matt Dean and Richard Kell

Full-Time: DONC 4 SCUN 3: I'd be gutted if something had rested on this game for United, but as it was, it didn't - and strangely, it made it into a better actual game of football. The Scunthorpe lads are clapped from the pitch by the United fans, who are jubilant even though their team have been robbed of a point in a really enthralling game. Donny meanwhile do their lap of honour to the tune of Ronan Keeting!

90 Min: Doncaster attack through injury time, this is beyond a deflated United now.

GOAL! DONC 4 SCUN 3 (MARTIS, 89): What a game this is. Someone was always going to get another, and it really could have been either side, but today it's Donny. Martis heads/bundles the corner (that resulted from the last sequence of play) home after it's caught in the box for a spell when United don't manage to clear it.

88 Min: United could have just taken the lead at one end. and now Donny could have just taken it up the other. Murph saves a great effort from eighteen-yards, but I'm not sure who it was from, sorry.

85 Min: Forte is playing really well today by the way. He'll be looking for a new contract, and this performance won't be doing him any harm at all. All I can hear now is the Scunny fans as Hooper dashes into the area but hooks wide.

GOAL! DONC 3 SCUN 3 (HOOPER, 84): It's been coming, in the last passage of play Jonathan Forte hit the bar, and in this one Gary Hooper goes one better. I thought it would come, and he heads home a cross to level this frantic game. Oh, twenty for the season for Hoops!

81 Min: United are unlucky not to get a penalty in my view when Shelton Martis stops Jonathan Forte just inside the box in the manner that you'd expect to see a bouncer restrain stop someone. I'm talking arms wrapped fully around his body!

80 Min: Hooper supplies the ball to Jonathan Forte - how he'd love to score - in the box. Forte quickly chests the ball across his body onto his left-foot, but his strike is saved neatly by Neil Sullivan.

77 Min: Free in the area after some patient build-up play, James Hayter fires a sitter over the bar. Another for the 'my gran could've scored that' collection there methinks.

Subs: Donny bring on Heffernan for the effective Emmanuel-Thomas slightly before United change Thommo around with Forte.

72 Min: A two-on-two situation in attack ends with Gary Hooper switching the ball inside for Garry Thompson, who drags wide on his weaker foot. Neither men look happy with that particular outcome.

71 Min: Winger Garry Thompson tries, but eventually fails, to get on the end of Andrew Wright's deep cross. Scunthorpe are ceratinly still in the hunt for at least a point here.

70 Min: Scunthorpe's Josh Wright aims a corner at the middle section of the box; but it's headed away by Martis, who will still be keen to atone for his earlier error.

67 Min: Hooper is fouled on the edge of the box, and Scunny have a free-kick in a potentially prosperous area. McCann flashes it powerfully at goal; but Sullivan didn't even have to move in all honesty.

Sub: Brian Stock, who only made the Donny team today due to John Oster's injury that he obtained during the warm-up, is brought off for Dean Shiels.

63 Min: With his first touches, Josh Wright takes the ball and runs towards the corner. He might have shot on that run actually, but obviously decided against doing so for some reason. He picks out Hayes when he gets to the corner, but Hayes sends his low shot wide.s

Sub: Josh Wright hasn't got much game time as of late, but he's got thirty minutes to impress here at the expense of Woolford.

58 Min: This is a dangerous spell for United, during which they could easily lose this game. Donny are still pressing, and the defence looks fragile.

GOAL! DONC 3 SCUN 2 (HAYTER, 56): James Hayter gets possession on the edge of the area and basically takes advatage of a gap in the Scunny defence by weaving through it and rolling home off the post.

GOAL! DONC 2 SCUN 2 (HAYES, 51): Scunthorpe have given away some silly goals this season, but Doncaster have just gifted one to Scunthorpe that matches any of the erroneous ones we've shipped! Woolford played a header forwards that looked to be going nowhere, until Martis slipped, allowing Hayes to be in one-on-one. The striker, who the fans are now advising Adkins to "sign up" kept his cool and poked home to Sullivan's left.

47 Min: A shot from distance by Brian Stock clips Matt Sparrow and changes direction, but doesn't threaten Murphy in the slightest. It would've been ironic had it spun off Sparrow and into the net after his deflected goal in midweek, however.

Sub: For reasons that I can only presume are connected with injury, David Mifin is replaced by Sam Togwell this second period. Togwell goes to right-back, with Byrne moving in to centre-back.

45 Min: The leaders, Doncaster, get us going again. This will be United's final half of the season away from Glanford Park.

Half-Time: DONC 2 SCUN 1: The Donny fans have taken a shine to abusing Hooper, so he'll be determined to make sure that The Iron get back on level terms and get something from this! That aside, this has been an enjoyable game to watch so-far, with both teams actually wanting to go for it, rather than pegging themselves back through fear of shipping a goal. Rovers lead, but this isn't over. ATT: 12,124 (1,980 away)

GOAL! DONC 2 SCUN 1 (MUTCH, 44): Drifting in at the back post, Jordon Mutch connects with a Roberts cross - stabbing it into the ground so that it tricks Murphy with how it bounces - and Scunny are behind.

43 Min: Jay Emmanuel-Thomas tries to double his money, but it thwarted by an eager Joe Murphy, who turns the striker's dink onto the post and out of play. The Arsenal loanee was on the edge of the box when he hit that, but had to curl it round a defender.

36 Min: The Iron miss a great opportunity to go ahead for a second time today after Martyn Woolford breaks from wide and squares the ball for Paul Hayes to tap home from close-range. Even though the striker gets a vital touch a covering Donny defender jumps in legitimately and turns the ball behind for a corner. Byrne connects nicely with that, sending it slightly wide, but the referee awards Donny a free-kick for pushing anyway.

35 Min: From the edge of the area Mutsch strikes a carbon-copy of his earlier unsuccessful effort. Again he's on the eighteen-yard line, and again it goes over.

33 Min: For some strange and unapparent reason the home fans are shocked when Brian Stock enters the book for a lunge on Hooper that didn't yield the ball. Both Hoops and Thommo are fuming at Stock for that.

29 Min: A sarcastic round of applause greets the linesman's decision to flag for a Gary Hooper offside. If he hadn't have called it then it would have been a decision on a par with the Drogba goal against Manchester United, mind.

26 Min: James Hayter, the man who came to Doncaster from Bournemouth along with Sean O'Driscoll and like Lee Trundle used to score against us a heck of a lot in the lower leagues, sees a point-blank header turned off the line by Paul Hayes of all people.

GOAL! DONC 1 SCUN 1 (EMMANUEL-THOMAS, 21): Blast my objectivity for cursing things! Jay Emmanuel-Thomas latches onto a hopeful crossfield ball and knocks it over Murphy and into the net. Nice finish.

20 Min: But I feel that it's my duty to stress to you that Doncaster could just as easily have taken the lead before United did. The home crowd are growing restless now though.

GOAL! DONC 0 SCUN 1 (HOOPER, 18): The classic combination prevails again. Hayes feeds Hooper down the left of the area, and the striker sends a slightly lofted finish into the far side of the gaping net. Sullivan got a hand to it, but he was stretching and unable to keep it out. Nineteen for the season for Hooper - eighteen in the league.

15 Min: After Scunthorpe win a throw on the right, which Byrne throws towards the angle of the 'D', Woolford drives a low shot at goal. It goes wide, but has Sullivan scampering across his goal. Woolford, Hayes and Hooper were all stood in the same area on the edge of the box then, and the defence didn't have a clue who they should mark!

11 Min: A serious save is made for the first time today by Joe Murphy. James Coppinger cuts in from the left and bends a nasty little shot that's creeping inside the post, but Murphy manages to keep it out with a strong fist.

10 Min: Doncaster midfielder Jordon Mutsch is fed the ball on the edge of the area. He swivels on it, making room for a left-footed shot, but he hits it miles over when he should really (at least) have worked Joe Murphy.

5 Min: Just being informed that Donny's John Oster was injured in the warm-up, and has been replaced in their team by Brian Stock. Sean McDaid is on the bench instead.

3 Min: The away fans quickly abandon their latest bouts of chanting about United preserving their status when Gary Hooper gets in the area with the ball at his feet. Instead the expectation, expressed by an alternate howling noise over to my left increases rapidly; but then decreases just as rapidly when Sam Hird gets a foot in and turns Gary away. 

1 Min: Scunthorpe, aiming to become the fourth consecutive away team to win at The Keepmoat, kick-off.

Teams are out... and the fans are already exchanging banter, but it's hardly a hostile enviroment. For the final time, United are kitted out in their blue away strip.

Under ten minutes to go now... and I'm pretty impressed with the away support. Scunny have manages to fill the vast manjority of the stand behind the goal away to my left, and each and every one of those fans has been in fantastic voice so-far. If they didn't know before, I think that people in nearby Sheffield will realise that Scunthorpe are "staying up" by now.

Again, the sun is shining down on us as the build-up gets into swing... Many people are stood in concourses of the stand having a sly pint, so as Billy Sharp is welcomed onto the pitch (by both sets of fans) for a presentation the stadium announcer informs the crowd that "it's an offence to purchase or attempt to purchase alcohol for those under the age of eighteen" - does that mean people have tried, and if so, who'd have thought it, eh!? Twenty minutes until we start.

Bet365 are offering odds of 12-1 on a 2-2 draw... Personally, I think that could be a nice little gainer, considering that the last two matches between these two teams have gone that way. Although in fairness, United probably should have won here last time around - they threw away a two goal lead at The Keepmoat back in January 2007 in what proved to be Andy Keogh's last game for the club.

By contrast, Rovers will also be without key players... Billy Sharp, a Scunthorpe legend, continues to be sidelined with a thigh problem; and midfielder Martin Woods, who once picked to play League 1 football with Donny over Championship football with Scunthorpe, is absent following groin surgery. Brian Stock and Jason Shackell are in their 'maybe' category.

Good day and welcome... Scunthorpe enter their final away game of the season versus out-of-form Doncaster without the services of some players: defenders Jones, Raynes and McNulty will all miss out through injury. Resultantly, Milne should partner Mirfin at the back so long as his knee is settled, and If not, I assume that Canavan will instead.