Newark Town footballer Sam Wright drives 70 miles to wrong ground after thinking his team were playing away to St Neots

Newark Town player Sam Wright was the butt of his team-mates’ jokes - after driving 70 miles to the wrong ground.

Wright mistakenly thought the Blues were playing St Neots away in the United Counties League Cup on Saturday after misreading a message on the group chat.

He made the journey to Cambridgeshire only to learn it was actually a home tie.

Wright, who was due to start the game, arrived back in Newark shortly before kick-off and was able to go on the bench.

He came on as a second-half substitute and completed the scoring as Town staged a remarkable comeback from 3-0 down to win 5-3.

“I got a phone call at meet time saying where is everyone?” said Newark boss Luke Parsons.

“Well, he knows where we normally are, and then he goes, ‘I’ve messed up, I’m in St Neots’.

“Where we meet quite early, at half past one, he had enough time to get back so he could go on the bench.

“You know what lads are like, there was a bit of ripping into him and saying how you can be so thick and all this stuff.

“It was all laughter and giggles - I think it’ll always be remembered.

“To be fair, if it had been at St Neots, we would probably have put a bus on.

“The fact I didn’t put a postcode in the group chat and I put we were playing at home in blue would have been a giveaway to most people but clearly not everyone!

“I need to be a bit more wiser with the words I put in the group.

“It’s nice that he came on and scored. It completes the rollercoaster ride, doesn’t it?”

Newark trailed 2-0 at half-time and conceded again three minutes into the second half.

But Luke Anderson, Sean Woolley and Sam Bartle squared the match before late goals from Ryan Smith and Wright completed a brilliant comeback.

“It’s certainly why you enjoy football, days like that,” said Parsons.

“We’ve shown in previous weeks what we’re made of.

“We never say die and we showed that again. We always believe we can get something from the game.

“Most teams would have folded but the instructions were I’d rather lose 4-0 than not give it a go and we got our rewards.

“As soon as it went to 3-3 I said to my skipper we don’t change a thing.

“I said I’m not here to take it to penalties, I’m here to win the game.

“We knew the momentum was going to be with us and we continued to play as if we were 3-0 down and went on to win it.”

Newark return to United Counties Premier Division North action at home to Bourne Town this Saturday (3pm) and they host Skegness Town on Wednesday (7.45pm).

The Blues are ninth in their first year up, having lost only two of their opening eight league games.

“We’re pleased with how it’s going, especially when you look at the teams we’ve played,” said Parsons.

“We’ve played three of the teams in the top five and we’ve played one of them twice.

“We’ve not played anyone in the bottom three yet.

“I’m not saying they’re guaranteed wins but we’ve played the more difficult teams on paper and hopefully we can kick on.

“Bourne will be another difficult game because they’re in the top six.

“Every time we play someone they seem to be in top six.”