After a very eventful and entertaining game played in extremely wet conditions, Stafford Town left Coventry soaked to the skin, miserable and feeling extremely hard done by having succumbed to a 96th minute equaliser. Having started very much on the front foot ‘Town’ raced to a 2-0 half time lead with cool finishes from young Nathan Scott after 13 mins and then Anwar Olugbon on the half hour mark. The complexion of the game changed just 24 seconds into the restart when returning CB Josh Webb went to ground and gave the hosts the opportunity to half the deficit from the penalty spot. Eden Mukenge duly obliged. Some six minutes later and ‘Town’ regained the comfort of a two-goal cushion as Kyle Ashman finished with a cool head. On the hour mark however, Sean Kavanagh scored to make it an interesting final half hour for the brave souls in attendance. What happened in the final stages of the game left the ‘Town’ players furious and the management rather dumbstruck. In the 88th minute a rather rash, lunged tackle resulted in the socks of the ‘Town’ player being ripped from the studs of the tackler. The free kick was duly awarded but no caution handed out and as goalkeeper Joe Morris put the ball down to take it he asked the nearside assistant “could you not see raised studs from your angle?” This resulted in the assistant flagging the attention of the referee for the second time in the game and Morris being sin binned. ‘Town’ were down to ten men with make-shift CB Tom Duffy donning the gloves for the second time this season. Wave after wave of attacks ensued in what everyone thought was the last minute of so of proceedings and in the 96th minute Kavanagh scored his brace to deny the visitors all three points. Town joint manager Steve Barrow was at pains to choose his words carefully when asked to comment – “I’m struggling to see where seven minutes of added time comes from especially when the final four minutes came after the referee has stated there was a minute to play whilst holding a single finger in the air. My keeper has asked the assistant a question from roughly 20 yards away as he was on the edge of his penalty area and he categorically hasn’t sworn as I heard him word for word. The assistant says he wanted him sin binned for dissent not for what he said but for running up to his face and shouting aggressively. This literally didn’t happen, and I just wish he’d have let the man in the middle officiate the game as overall he did a great job. Perhaps the assistant has ideas on becoming a referee himself? Dom and I run a tight ship and regularly remind our players how critical officials are to the survival of the game we all love. We’ll continue to preach this as we believe it however several elements of today’s experience haven’t made that pushing the message any easier. Anyway, lets close this one off by acknowledging Copsewoods desire to stay in the game and for getting something from it. It was a good encounter from a footballing perspective.”
