Still smarting from our first league defeat of the season the previous week

With memories of last year’s open and exciting matches, both sides set up in similar fashion with a clear emphasis on attack.

The opening goal arrived in the first five minutes, when a foul immediately in front of the dugout went unpunished, the resulting diagonal pass into the box caused sufficient confusion and saw Jason Massing adjudged to have fouled his man.

The penalty confidently swept home giving Fisher no chance.
For fifteen minutes we hung on in there, alarmingly out passed and out manoeuvred all around the pitch. That said Badshots style does give you room to play and there were occasional glimpses of hope if we could improve our game just slightly.

A flurry of corners and free kicks offered some encouragement as the visiting keeper perhaps affected by the sun, seemed reluctant to get too involved with matters that I’m sure his manager would have expected him to be part of.

Mid way through the half and slightly out of nothing clever inter play between Robbie Burns and Zak Graham saw Grahams long distance shot elude the goalkeeper to bring us level. The goal served us well and the following fifteen minute spell saw us now marginally the more dominant of the two sides. Badshot were however always a threat and to be honest opportunities were created and missed at both ends.

On thirty-nine minutes the turning point came. Again Graham and Burns combined, and the intelligent run of the latter saw him through one on one only to be unceremoniously fouled by the keeper. The most lengthy of delays followed, firstly to treat the injured Burns and secondly for the referee to deliberate for some time over what action to take on the keeper. Eventually the only logical decision was reached, and he produced a red card. Unfortunately Zak Grahams spot kick was saved and the game turned on its head. Robbie Burns crept back on the pitch following the miss hoping to be ok to continue, but in the minute that he gave himself we fell behind to a well-struck effort from twenty-five yards, although to be fair the lack of pressure on the ball was alarming.

And so from the possibility of two one up against ten men, we reached the half two one down, and had given Badshot Lea an opportunity to re group and hold on to their slender lead.

At the restart it was clear that despite the man advantage we weren’t going to find it easy. Badshot retaining a high tempo and attacking approach, and feeling comfortable in keeping the game open.

The occasional chance came and went and at times it appeared that we were waiting for something to happen, almost expecting the man advantage to tell eventually. It’s never that easy and the replacement keeper was rarely troubled. In general we lacked any real ideas. When the passing did improve and half chances were created we were then let down by the final ball or wayward finishing, and despite being a man light Badshot remained comfortable in defence and dangerous on the break.

Just after the hour mark another average decision by the young referee saw a free kick awarded to Badshot Lea. As it was swung in from the left and through a melee of players it was delicately helped on its way and the deft flick found the corner of the net. Huge questions needed asking of the defence who decided to defend as deep as their own six-yard box, giving little or no opportunity for Fisher to follow the flight of the ball.

With caution thrown to the wind in order to chase the game we were being caught more and more. An acceptable outcome if you are actually achieving something out of an all out attacking approach, but sadly we were not. Time and again we gifted the ball back to our opponents and in all honesty it was difficult to tell what side was a player down.

The disappointing day just kept getting worse with the over fussy referee out of his depth and making decisions that did little for the game, other than to anger players and officials of both sides. One such moment with fifteen minutes to go quite unbelievable, when a perfectly executed tackle by Chris Davidson was adjudged to have been a foul resulting in the third penalty of the match. Fisher pulling off a fine stop giving us a glimmer of hope of snatching something from the game.

Any such hopes were well and truly extinguished in the final minute when an energetic break from Badshot saw our own players happy to be out run, allowing the scorer a simple tap in at the back post.
All in all a disappointing day and result. A wake up call at the very least, and a clear indication that further changes might be needed if we are to sustain a challenge at the top.