It was another day when the “Manager of the Month” curse struck as a moment of madness from skipper Ben Payne in the end proved so decisive as VCD Athletic lost their perfect home League record to second placed Heybridge Swifts.

But full credit to Tony Russell’s side for the way the responded to losing their skipper after only 13 minutes and in the end they came so agonisingly close to gaining an extremely unlikely point.

Boss Tony Russell after the game admitted, “I don’t want to have a go at the referee and I really don’t think that the tackle warranted a red card.”

“But to do it after 13 minutes kills the game. All the hard work you’ve put in on the training field gets blown out of the window and for 15 minutes we really were all over the place!”

On the plus side for the Vickers boss was his sides praise for his seconds display after half time; “Second half I thought we were brilliant.”

“To be fair we murdered them second half and but for a poor final ball and some wayward shooting we would have got something out of the game.”

“I’m well proud of my players today – after going down to ten men so early if you’d have turned up in the second half you wouldn’t have and known we were a man short.”

“We kept our belief and discipline and football is all about if’s, but’s and maybe’s – I can ask from anymore from my players.”

“There are so many positives to come out of today – we’ve dominated a game with ten men for nearly eighty minutes; how can I ask more of my players than that?”

“We’ve lost but there’s loads of positives from our point of view to take out of today!”

Yet deep down it was a frustrating end to VCD’s unbeaten league run for the boss, as Heybridge took full advantage of Payne’s dismissal to take the lead on 20 minutes when Luke Callender, Michael Cheek combined well down the left and as the ball fell to Neil Cousins, his drive cannoned into the net off of a VCD defender.

It was a lead that was doubled on the hour, when again Heybridge took advantage once more of the extra space.

A big clearance from keeper Danny Sambridge caught out the VCD defence down the left allowing Callender to nip in and lift the ball over Nick Blue and into the VCD net.

Ten minutes from time a near miraculous recovering tackle from Ray Powell denied Cheek and it was almost as though the challenge game the home side the extra impetus.

Sadly within two minutes they missed a guilt edged chance as Dean Carpenter was fouled by Sambridge (a caution which wide on the right of the box resulted in the keeper “only” be shown a yellow card.

Up stepped Peter Smith who smashed the ball goal wards only for Sambridge to atone with a great block – an even better block followed by the keeper from James Duckworth’s follow up…

Duckworth did find the net on 85 minutes after a great one two with Sherwin Stanley before drilling the ball into the bottom corner.

Boss Russell will no doubt see many good points from his sides second half display – at least even with this loss his side still have an eight point cushion going into the holiday month of December.

VCD – Blue, Powell, Craig, Reeves, Payne, Smith, Carpenter, Dent (Moorse-MacDougall 60), Zanone (Stanley 71), Duckworth, Addae (Adjei 78)

Sub not used – Rabiu

HEYBRIDGE – Sambridge, Doyle, Barber, Morgan, Hastings, Kersey, Cousins, Amass, Callander (Bantik 90), Cheek, Malton (Newson 73)

Subs not used – Moore and King

Referee – Mr Farrer
Assistants – Mr Lukauskis and Mr Carpenter