Liskeard Athletic 1 St Austell 5
Cornwall Senior Cup holders St Austell are through to this season's semi-finals after overcoming Liskeard at Lux Park in an entertaining quarter-final on Friday night.
But the scoreline was harsh on the division one west hosts, who led for almost half an hour in the first half and also missed a penalty at a crucial stage in the second half with St Austell only 2-1 ahead.
Ben Collins fired Liskeard into a 13th minute lead with a stunning left foot volley from the edge of the box and it took until the 36th minute for the Lillywhites to level things up through Neil Slateford.
St Austell manager Phil Lafferty was clearly unimpressed by his players' first half performance and his half-time talk was brief, and probably to the point, as he returned to the dugouts five minutes before his players.
With no clear improvement in the early stages of the second half, Lafferty introduced Olly Brokenshire in place of Dan Hart in the 58th minute and the change worked almost immediately.
After Liskeard had had strong claims for a penalty rejected by referee Ben Judd after Martin Giles clumsily barged into the back of Rob Cleveland, St Austell swept to the other end and Harry Evans' low ball into the middle saw Brokenshire fire into the net to make it 2-1 after 62 minutes.
Liskeard refused to buckle and they had a golden chance to equalise in the 68th minute when they were awarded a penalty after Evans had handled Macauley Thorp's shot.
Thorp stepped up to take the spot kick and struck it well but St Austell keeper Jason Chapman was equal to it, diving at full stretch to his left to tip the ball around the post.
That proved to be the big turning point because two minutes later St Austell increased their lead through Evans after Liam Eddy had done all the hard work on a break along the left.
It was 4-1 in the 83rd minute when a weak Eddy shot from wide on the left squirmed under the body of Liskeard keeper Jamie Blatchford, who had been having a brilliant evening between the sticks.
And the scoring was completed in the third minute of added time when substitute Lee Whetter lashed home a penalty after Eddy had been brought down.
Liskeard: Blatchford, Lindsay, King, Gilbert, Hoskin, Thorp, R Cleveland, J Woods, T Cleveland, Aplin, Collins (Small 85). Subs not used: Walker, Coates, Cornew.
Goal: Collins (13).
Yellow card: Collins (25).
St Austell: Chapman, Lean, Mulready, Dingle (Whetter 75), Giles, Williams, Evans, Hart (Brokenshire 56), Eddy, Nancarrow (Body 83), Slateford. Subs not used: Sims, Deadman.
Goals: Slateford (36), Brokenshire (62), Evans (70), Eddy (83), Whetter (90+3, pen).
Referee: Ben Judd.
