Report
A point gained rather than a point lost, and that point won against all the odds, still left a bitter taste in the mouth for the Wadham Lodge faithful as they saw their team take a 2-0 lead in the first half hour only to have it taken away from them in controversial circumstances.
Sittingbourne made the early play but it was the Stags who looked more dangerous through the marauding runs of Dewayne Clarke and Ian Cooper so it was just reward when they it was the took the lead on five minutes when Dewayne Clarke latched on to a long ball from the middle of the defence. Clarke cut through the flat footed Sittingbourne defence and dragged the ball back to elude a defender before slotting home into the left corner of the net.
Sittingbourne went straight on the attack but could do little against stubborn home defending. They did however have a gilt edged chance on 9 minutes when Jack Tanner received a ball in from the left and only had Gavin King to beat but shot wide. The Stags turned defence into attack with Cooper getting through on the break only to lose control of the ball by slipping on the muddy ground after beating his defender.
It was not long before Papy Kanyuka got in on the act, scoring after 16 minutes. Clarke had come in at the left post and met a cross which he controlled well from a cut back for Kanyuka to side step his defender to rifle the ball home from 20 yards.
The Stags seemed now to hold all the cards and Ian Cooper could have had a third goal but he unluckily hit the underside of the crossbar and some lovely play between him and Clarke gave Paul Armand the space for a bicycle kick which was only inches wide. The Stags werev now rampant and really should have sown the game up when Kanyuka’s free kick swerved around the Sittingbourne wall only for Fewell to make an excellent reaction save putting the ball over the crossbar.
Then referee Mr Margetts took a hand in proceedings: first on the 38th minute he awarded Sittingbourne a penalty when the ball so obviously hit the hand of Panayioutis Panayioutou, then he sent off Carlos Brown for a tackle that seemed no worse than any he had let ride previously. This forced reorganisation in the home midfield with Clarke being taken off for Karabulut. This blunted the Stags’ attack and changed the whole complexion of the game.
The second half was not much better for the home side with Captain Simon Tickner being sent off for an off the ball incident that only the assistant referee saw. This was a strange occurrence for the mere fact that the referee had spent the whole match in oblivion where his assistant was concerned: his positioning and ball watching was so bad that he had missed the flag going up for at least four off side signals up to that point.
It seemed that Mr Margetts was now allowing dangerous tackle after dangerous tackle go because the home forwards were too fast to be caught but scything tackles are just that and they are dangerous: why did so many of them go unpunished?
To rub salt into the wound, Sitttingbourne’s pressure finally paid off when Clint Gooding scored the equaliser after a long cross to the far post where the lack of players had left him alone and unmarked to head the ball back the way it had come and into the net.