Brabin: Tiredness a factor in Quakers draw

HATTERS boss Gary Brabin felt tiredness played a factor in his side’s 1-1 draw at Darlington on Tuesday night, writes Mike Simmonds.

Town had played with 10 men for 77 minutes and then nine for well over half an hour the previous weekend against York City, and Brabin put what he perceived as a disappointing performance, particularly in the first half, down to their FA Trophy exertions.

He said: “We had a tough game on Saturday and I thought one or two looked a little bit tired from the events.

“From our point of view, I thought it was a very tired, lacklustre first half. We just didn’t do enough and I thought we needed to get out of first gear.”

Brabin made a change at the break, bringing on Stuart Fleetwood for Danny Crow, and the visitors dominated the opening exchanges, with Quakers keeper Jordan Pickford making a handful of top-drawer saves.

The boss continued: “Crowy’s played upfront on his own Saturday so he was one of the victims if you like. I brought some fresh legs on in Fleets and I thought we looked a little bit more lively.

“We’ve created enough chances. Their keeper got man of the match and made some good saves.

“A couple of decision which have baffled us have gone against us and we were 1-0 down, but I thought we showed a little bit of character and pulled back an equaliser.”

Although the hosts are in a wretched run of form themselves and currently in the bottom four of the Conference, Brabin didn’t think it gave his side a divine right to the three points.

He said: “Like I said, they haven’t won for 10 games, 11 now, but they’re not getting beat by margins. They’ve still got some good players, they’re only down there because of the points deduction, so I don’t think it’s a case of expecting to win.

“We’ve got to give them respect, it was never going to be easy.”

In a mad last eight minutes which saw Hatters defender Janos Kovacs wrongly sent off, Town concede two penalties, which should have been three, and Fleetwood nicking a last-minute equaliser, Darlo boss Craig Liddle was far from impressed with the display of referee Richard Wigglesworth, especially for his failure to spot Ed Asafu-Adjaye’s foul on John McReady with the hosts 1-0 up.

He said: “I’d rather speak about the performance because I thought the boys were fantastic against a team that has spent a lot of money, but all the talk will be about the penalty decision.

“He (Wigglesworth) was the only person inside the ground that didn’t think it was a penalty.

“Gary Brabin and Alan Neilson both thought it was a penalty, the fourth official did too.

“John (McReady) has got stud marks on his ribs, so how the ref thinks he’s got them if he’s not been fouled I don’t know.”

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