Despite playing the equivalent of almost half the game with an extra man the Missioners failed to create very much at all against a well drilled Havant side at Church Road on Tuesday evening, in fact the only time visiting stopper Shane Gore was called into the action was after 15 minutes when he saved a Kieran Knight effort with an outstretched leg.

Things didn't start too badly for the home side however, Josh Scott outpaced defender Mickey Warner with just five minutes on the watch but sadly his cross to a waiting Daniel Dyer was cut out in the nick of time by a sliding Hawks skipper Tom Jordan.

Minutes later our own stopper Kevin Davies was called into action, the ever dangerous Brett Poate shrugged off his challenging defender before feeding Richard Pacquette but Davies was equal to his weak effort. A fine move shortly afterwards by the home side almost drew first blood, Scott broke away from his own half before placing the ball into Knight's path only for Gore to stick out a leg and force the ball away for a corner.

With the game lacking any real flair, the referee Mr James decided he would liven up proceedings by reducing the visitors to ten men. Having injured himself fouling Gilbert Nuako, Hawks midfielder Mo Harkin was receiving treatment just off the pitch and we can only speculate that words must have been had with the referees assistant as Mr James produced a straight red card for the injured player and a yellow for the physio. There followed a time in the game where a foul brought a caution and we began to wonder how many more red cards would come as the game wore on?

Just five minutes later Will Hendry played a free-kick towards the danger area and a Daniel Dyer touch took the ball towards Scott who tumbled to the floor under challenge and obviously felt hard done by as Mr james played on as he soon received a yellow card, we can only assume for too much back chat to the official, this was to prove his downfall later in the game.

Not to be phased, Scott again charged forwards minutes later before hitting an excellent crossfield pass to Feeney who beat Warner before drawing Gore and firing high and wide of the goal to his own visible disgust. As the half began to draw to a close a couple more needless yellow cards were produced and when we got back to watching the players, Hendry saw a snap shot from 25 yards go just wide of the target and Hawks defender Jordan twice went close, first heading over and then being denied by a smart diving stop by Davies.

The Hawks started the second period as quickly as we had started the first despite being a man short, Warner's cross from the right was inadvertently flicked on by Orlando Jeffrey to Poate, his shot was blocked by Davies and the excellent Peter Collins was on hand to hack the loose ball to safety. Minutes later it was Poate and Collins again in the thick of the action as the Hayes defender was perfectly placed to play the midfielders effort of the line.

Despite the numerical advantage we created not a single noteworthy effort in this half until I had to make note of our own reduction to ten men. Scott began to chase a throughball only to plough into the static figure of Jordan whereby he kicked out at the defender leaving Mr James little chance but to dismiss him and thus even up the sides.

From this point and even beforehand it looked like if their were to be a winner it was not going to be Hayes, Poate broke away down the left flank, his cross flicked off Collins and fell beautifully for Pacquette but he fired across Davies goal and wide of the far post. We did have a brief sniff at goal three minutes from time when a Nuako free-kick was chested to Knight by Logie but the strikers effort was just too high to trouble Gore.

Then just as the game entered stoppage time we became orchestrators of our own downfall, having earned a throw near our own goal line we decided to mess around with the ball only to have it snatched from us by Tony Taggart who proceeded to fire across the area where the deadly former Missioner Rocky Baptiste nipped in to say "thank you very much" and thump the ball past Davies from close range.

Report by Kevin Watts.