WE need go back no further than Tuesday night's FA Trophy to realise that at times the game has a nasty habit of kicking one in the teeth.

WE need go back no further than Tuesday night's FA Trophy to realise that at times the game has a nasty habit of kicking one in the teeth. Travelling to Kings Lynn the general consensus of opinion was that we had missed our chance on Saturday but in fact that was far from the truth.

Having overcome the loss of the unavailable Stuart Boardley and Danny Cunningham, manager Mark Morsley also found himself without the motivational Chris Tracey through injury.

If that wasn't bad enough we then found ourselves behind after just five minutes before further misfortunate came in the loss of the impressive Sheridan Driver who limped out of the fray.

Despite this, and just as we had on Saturday, we took the game to Kings Lynn and David Head deservedly put us level.

Jamie Rowe then looked to have given us the lead only for his effort to be ruled out for offside and a Paul Smith goal was then ruled out for a supposed infringement on the goalkeeper.

Then came the double kick in the teeth as first Jamie Rowe was upended in the penalty area with just seconds left leaving the Kings Lynn supporters mighty relieved and unbelieving that a penalty had not been given.

Was it to try and make amends that the referee then gave us an indirect free kick on the six yard box which somehow the massed defence on the goal-line managed to keep out.

Inexplicably now into the fifth minute of stoppage time, of which there had been little, Kings Lynn broke to the other end where Matt Nowlan took full advantage of Nathan Munson's hesitancy at a cross to head home leaving just time for us to kick off. Is it any wonder that throughout the squad and the faithful travelling support everyone was left absolutely stunned and feeling somewhat cheated. Earlier on Saturday we had surprised our Southern Premier League opponents making them look very ordinary as we were by far the better side, a fact subsequently very fairly recognised by their Tuesday programme notes.

Chris Bacon will be wondering for weeks how he twice failed to score against his former club and likewise skipper David Head missed an equally easy chance to have snatched the game with just minutes left.

Earlier the Kings Lynn keeper Scott Howie had pulled off a top class penalty save to keep out David Head's well placed kick.

Over the two games the team had nevertheless shown that we could hold our own at a higher level and we can only hope that we can repeat and sustain this form over the weeks ahead.

Whilst it looks a certainty we will be without Neil Calver transfer listed at his own request his loss has been more than compensated by Mark managing to get Paul Smith back to the club. In both games against Kings Lynn Paul looked the quality player that he is having seemingly so much time on the ball. Neil's combative style will still be missed although the club's disciplinary record will show an immediate improvement.

Ian Manby's reserves saw their last hopes of a quality final League Cup place finally vanish with defeats at Witham Reserves last Saturday and then at home on Tuesday. Jack Hines scored our only goal on Saturday and new signing Vlad Dragos on Tuesday.

No midweek game next week with the next game being a visit to Potters Bar next Saturday. The reserves welcome Clacton Reserves to Kings Marsh next Saturday as they settle hopefully into a run of league fixtures

MARSHMAN