Telford United 1 Kingstonian 1

I'm sure the travelling Ks fans on arrival at the ramshackle Bucks Head ground would have settled for a draw. Before the game they heard that David Leworthy was in bed with the flu and captain Matt Crossley was out with a thigh strain. But overall it was a disappointing case of two points dropped.

The home side played most of the game with 10 men and for an hour seemed demoralised upfront. As the game progressed, Ks sat back on their one-goal lead and then allowed United in to snatch a point right at the death.

A scrappy game with moves constantly breaking down and the ball spending far too much time in the air saw the visitors have the best of the opening stages and it was no great surprise in the ninth minute when Eddie Akuamoah made a run into the Telford box and passed back to Tarkan Mustafa on the right, his curling low cross was met beautifully by a full-stretch, diving Scott Corbett header a few yards out.

Four minutes later Corbett threaded a ball through to Akuamoah racing into the home box and looking for the second goal, but his strike was well blocked by keeper Dean Williams. Ks applied the pressure and on 22 minutes Akuamoah turned Marcus Jones to race on goal alone, but Jones pulled the Ks striker back and was sent off. Midfielder Geoff Pitcher took the resultant free-kick and curled it over the wall to beat keeper Williams. Unluckily, it hit the post. On 40 minutes a long run by Corbett down the left set up Mustafa who pushed the ball out to Joe Francis on the right, and his sweet near post cross saw a rare Akuamoah header that was just blocked by Williams. As the ball ran free Pitcher pounced but he was just denied.

In the final minute of the half we saw the start of the Telford revival when left winger Craig Shakespeare took a short corner to Mark Turner and his far-post cross was met by striker Scott Huckerby a couple of yards out. His strike somehow skidded along the bar to safety.

Three minutes into the new half it was Huckerby again who should have equalised. Norbury lashed an inch-perfect through ball to Huckerby who raced down the middle of park pursued by Wayne Brown. He chose to place it past Scott Barrett but the keeper got down quickly and turned it round for a corner. Telford brought on Steve Palmer and Brian Gray who invigorated the attack but they were still held to chances outside Ks' box.

On 76 minutes Telford sub Brian Gray found wing back Martyn Naylor, who had a lot of room down the right and he found an unmarked Norbury deep inside the Ks' box but he just failed to control. Ks now seemed happy to soak up the pressure and concentrate on isolated counter-attacks. On 86 minutes Shakespeare blasted goalwards but Barrett held well. It wasn't until the 87th minute that the Ks slipped up when Palmer floated in a high cross to the far post for Bentley to win a header from Stewart, and as the ball fell to ground he blasted it past Barrett. In the final minute it looked like the Ks might nick a winner, like last Saturday, when Colin Luckett floated in a well-struck corner for Stewart to rise above everybody, he directed his header across the face of the goal and it just went wide. At the final whistle the grandstand rose to applaud the Telford team's effort, and they thoroughly deserved it.

Ks: Scott Barrett, Tarkan Mustafa, Colin Luckett, Wayne Brown, Simon Stewart, Mark Harris (capt), Gary Patterson, Geoff Pitcher (sub Rattray 83 mins), Joe Francis (sub Holligan 88 mins), Scott Corbett, Eddie Akuamoah, Russell Watkinson.

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