Presteigne St Andrews Under 18s slipped to their first defeat of the Herefordshire FA Floodlit League season when they were beaten 5-2 at home by Ludlow Town.
Trevor Gummer admitted his side had paid the price for a poor first-half showing in which they had allowed themselves to be bullied by their opponents who took a match-winning 5-1 interval lead.
Callum Matthews was on target for Presteigne who never really recovered from falling three goals behind in the opening 10 minutes.
“We didn’t do the basics well enough – we were bullied out of the ball and failed to deal with a couple of balls into our box,” admitted Trevor.
“The lads were given a serious rollocking at half-time although they didn’t really need me to tell them they had played poorly.
“We did raise the game in the second half, but there was never going to be any way back from a 5-1 deficit.
“I suppose you could say we won the second half 1-0, but that is small compensation for the overall showing,” he added.
Callum Matthews netted his second goal of the night when Tristan Emery’s run ended with a good ball in from which Callum finished with ease.
Presteigne created a number of other good chances while they also felt aggrieved they were not given a penalty when Connor Bird appeared to be barged over inside the area, but the referee said ‘nothing doing’.
There will be a detailed report on the match at some stage on Tuesday 26 October.