Tonbridge Angels 2 Lowestoft Town 2

Match 78/17/1528 - Saturday, 6th January 2018 - Bostik Premier

Tonbridge Angels (2) 2 Vidal (pen) 3 Turner 12
Lowestoft Town (1) 2 Hodd 45 Cotton 73
Attendance: 438

Entrance: £6 Senior
Programme: £2.50
Mileage: 38/5,191

Give it Away, a monotonous rap rock song from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers (Google sourced) blasted out from the media tower as people, some disgruntled, filed away from Longmead Stadium. This was not a song that I was familiar with, or would want to be, but I realised that this was Dave Brown (the stadium announcer) indulging in a little irony. When I later pressed him on social media, he said “it went over most people’s head”, which I take as a complement that it didn’t go over mine.

Giving it away was the immediate cause for disgruntlement as Tonbridge surrendered a two goal lead they had built within the opening 12 minutes. But the threat, if not the reality, is that this season is in danger of petering out to mid-table mediocrity as early as January is the source of much greater consternation to those supporters.

The Angels could not have wished for a better start. The Suffolk-based visitors had barely got the long journey out of their legs when a Jack Parter throw-in was headed on by Dan Thompson into the path of Alex Akrofi who easily got clear of a sleeping Harry Barker to round the Lowestoft goalkeeper, Ben Dudzinski, who brought him down. Xavier Vidal stepped up to successfully convert the spot kick low to his left, with the keeper guessing wrong.

With the confidence of the early goal, Tonbridge played as well as at any time this season, slick passing movements cutting through the Trawlerboys with Akrofi just failing to double the advantage after being sent clear by Joe Turner.

The lead was doubled after 12 minutes when a long punt forward from Dan Bennett left Turner in a one-on-one chase with Daniel Humphries. Turner was too strong for the youngster, took the ball on a couple of paces and slotted past Dudzinski.

After 34 minutes a sickening clash of heads saw Humphries and Parter needing urgent attention with the Lowestoft player looking in serious trouble. Thankfully, after a long delay, Humphries was able to leave the field on his feet but was immediately despatched to hospital; Parter was able to continue with his head heavily bandaged.

The delay seemed to drain the momentum out of Tonbridge and it was no surprise when in the extended period of time-added, a challenge won in midfield saw the ball sent forward to Harvey Hodd who confidently steered the ball into the bottom corner past the advancing Jonny Henly.

Lowestoft could have been level a minute later when a superb move ended with Jake Reed acrobatically firing just over the crossbar.

Lowestoft continued to hold the upper hand into the second half despite chances falling to Akrofi who wildly shot high and wide and another chance headed over.

The Suffolk side’s equaliser after 73 minutes was richly deserved when Reed cushioned a header into the path of Nico Cotton to beat Henly from 12 yards.

The introduction of Nathan Elder stemmed the tide somewhat and the game could have gone either way in the final quarter-hour.

The game marked the debut as new club Chairman for Roger Maddams. Roger is a bit of a musical aficionado, so he will be hoping that the departure music in future games is a bit more uplifting than the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.