Braintree 1 Havant & Waterlooville 3

Iron boss Brad Quinton is hopeful of signing a 30-year-old midfielder with Football League experience on Tuesday to bolster his young side and help them to regain top spot they lost after a comprehensive 3-1 defeat to Havant & Waterlooville, at Cressing Road on Saturday.

“I’m hoping is will all happen and he will give some much needed strength in midfield,” said Quinton, who described this defeat as “a bitter pill to swallow.”

“I am bitterly disappointed at the outcome particularly at giving away three penalties in the second half and some of my players were simply not at the races today.

“I think some were clearly not fit enough although they said they were and you simply can’t get away with that at this level of the game.

“It also means that their confidence goes when things start to go wrong and that’s what happened in the second half.”

In reality the Iron were second best throughout this game and Quinton admits it highlighted the shortcomings he has in certain areas of the field.

The damage was done by a hat-trick of second-half penalties from visiting striker Jason Prior. After a goalless first half Prior benefited from some dreadful individual mistakes by Iron defenders to convert his three penalties on 48, 53 and 78 minutes and although the Iron pulled a goal back courtesy of substitute Marcel Barrington on 66 minutes there was never any doubt which team was going to win and deservedly so.

The second half indeed was a disaster for the Iron from which they never recovered with first Osa Obamwonyi conceding a penalty two minutes into the restart and four minutes later Jon Muleba conceding another.

With substitutes Barrington and Roman Michael-Percil arriving on the hour the Iron had a brief spell of pressure, culminating with Barrington slotting the ball home from close range.

But on 78 minutes it went all wrong again for the Iron when a sloppy backpass from Obamwonyi left keeper Nathan McDonald exposed and has he tried to grab the ball in doing so brought down Wes Fogden for the third penalty which Prior netted.