THE Magpies hit a bump on their rebuilding campaign with a 3-2 defeat away at Chesham United on Tuesday night.
On a very poor playing surface, the visitors had the best of starts, as assistant manager Phil Gray celebrated his playing debut with a goal in the first three minutes.
Trialist Jon Christopher increased the lead on nine minutes, when he beat the Chesham keeper to a through ball, which looped into the unguarded net.
Chesham, though, found the conditions at the Meadow more to their liking and soon started to create chances of their own, with striker Ben Smith guilty of two glaring misses in front of goal.
On 22 minutes, Gray limped off with a calf injury to be replaced by new signing Martin Williams.
On the stroke of half-time, Chesham pulled one back, when a harshly awarded penalty was converted by Smith.
Early in the second half the referee limped off and United’s manager John Dreyer took over on the touchline.
And, ironically, it was a highly suspicious offside decision which led to Chesham’s equaliser, again through Smith.
United’s reserve secretary Matt Gore then took over the flag, only for the game to descend into farce with a string of strange refereeing decisions.
At one point, United midfielder Luke Costello was crudely taken out in front of the referee, resulting in the player being carried off, for which United were awarded a throw-in.
So it was no surprise when the referee awarded a penalty on 70 minutes, seconds after ignoring a blatant foul on Adam Durrant in the United box.
Ben Smith stepped up to convert the spot-kick, giving him a hat-trick.
United might have fought back but, to cap a frustrating evening, the referee played a 40-minute second half.

Maidenhead United: Wilson, Sanders, Connor, Christopher, Geraughty, Durrant, Ashe, McIntosh, Yaku, Lee, Gray. Subs: Polisano, Hart, Sealey, Costello, Adeoye, Williams. All used.