Carlsberg South West division one East

Totnes and Dartington 2

Tavistock AFC 1

THE Lambs' promotion aspirations took a real dent when they lost to mid table side Totnes and Dartington. The visitors lost their unbeaten away record at Fox Field as the home team pulled off a hard earned victory, recording only their fourth victory this season.

The Lambs got off to the worst possible start as the home team took the lead in the second minute, when Liam Collings curled in a perfect left foot shot from just inside the angle of the penalty area, into the top right hand corner of the net, giving Martin Piper no chance of saving.

The visitors found it extremely difficult to get their passing game going on what was a very heavy playing surface with a number of the players finding it not easy to keep their footing in the conditions.

The first real effort from the visitors came in the tenth minute when Harry Southcott had a fierce drive saved by the keeper. Three minutes later Kelvin Fyneboy had a good chance to level the scores but his shot hit side netting.

The Lambs were finding it difficult to break down a resilient home defence, as their passing was being played at far too slow a tempo; this allowed the opposition to get numbers behind the ball to form a blanket defence.

The home team extended their lead in the 26th minute when Fyneboy lost possession on the half way line; the counter attack resulted in a fine move, and Angus Wilson's perfect lay off was fired home by Ben Bowhay.

Dave Hallet for Tavistock went close with a long range shot which was just wide of the target, then Fyneboy and Maskell combined well, but Hulme screwed his shot wide of the target.

Just before the interval Dave Hallett's thunderous shot from 23 yards was well saved by the home keeper.

The second half saw the Lambs have plenty of possession, but again their passing was not crisp enough to cause the home defence real problems. They pushed more and more men forward to try a get that elusive goal to get them back in the game, but were failing to make any real impact. They continued to lose possession in vital areas of the park, by not making the ball do the work instead of individuals taking on defender after defender. This left the defence open to swift counter attacks from the home team. Midway through the half Martin Piper made two great saves to prevent the home team from extending their lead.

The Lambs kept trying but with little reward, as they spurned a couple of good chances to reduce the arrears, but once again the final ball was not good enough.

In the dying minutes the visitors were awarded a penalty, when a Totnes defender handled the ball in the penalty area. Fyneboy stepped up a fired the ball low into the corner of the net.

This was a disappointing performance as the team really struggled to adapt to the conditions, failing to produce their usual fluent football. The home team battled for everything, and played with total commitment and effort.