United lose battle of the Magpies (04.09.04)

A POOR performance from Maidenhead United saw Dorchester emerge victorious from the battle of the Magpies at York Road on Saturday.
After a bright start, United were hit by the early loss of striker Craig O'Connor through to injury.
He was replaced by Steve Hale, who has not seen much action this season and looked slightly lethargic and out of shape as a result.
However, United's failure was as a team, as they failed to adapt their style play and seemed to lack any cutting edge.
Even the normally dependable players were off the pace, but fortunately so were Dorchester, who contributed very little to a generally dour first half.
In an attempt to shake some life into his team, manager John Dreyer switched to a 3-5-2 formation for the second half.
Unfortunately, this allowed the visitors to exploit the extra space left at the back, which ultimately proved decisive.
With Brendan Gallen pressing on, Dorchester swept the ball forward on the counter-attack. Matt Groves turned his marker and sprinted forward and, while the defence stood waiting for the offside flag, he calmly picked his spot and slotted the ball past Michael Watkins into the bottom left-hand corner of the goal.
After this, things only for worse for United, with the final blow being the dismissal of Gallen following an alleged elbowing incident.
Down to 10-men United had no time and little energy left to launch any meaningful assault on the Dorchester goal, allowing the visitors to hold on.