DORCHESTER Town were disappointed not to pocket all three points following their 2-2 draw with 10-man Hendon at the Avenue Stadium, according to boss Tom Killick.
Dorchester weathered a slow start and grew into the first half, Olaf Koszela putting the Magpies in front with a 20-yard drive.
However, individual errors allowed Kurtis Cumberbatch to score twice in 22 minutes for the visitors.
Cumberbatch then gave Dorchester a sniff of a point, picking up his second yellow card, and the Magpies duly punished the Greens in stoppage-time.
READ MORE: Dorchester Town 2-2 Hendon - report
Their equaliser stemmed from a pearler of an inswinging cross by debutant Luke Pardoe, inviting Will Fletcher to attack the delivery and plant a firm header home for 2-2 in the 94th minute.
Speaking to Echosport, Killick harboured mixed emotions at the final whistle: “Frustration, really.
“I just felt we were in a winning position, we were at home. They were a good side, don’t get me wrong, but I felt we looked reasonably comfortable in terms of dealing with their attacking threat.
“Then we’ve made a mistake for the goal, got them back into it, then we’ve made another mistake and suddenly we’re staring down the barrel in a game where I felt that shouldn’t have been the case.
“So, that’s the negative, that we’ve got ourselves in a losing position from a winning position without, in my view, that needing to be the case.
“Then, the positive bit is that we did battle back and scored the goal. A draw was the least I felt we deserved.
“They’re a good side, they’re always going to exploit errors and that’s what they did.
“Battling back at the death gives you a little bit of euphoria, you’re finishing on a bit of a high you hope leads towards the better end of it going into your next game.
“We’ve got to keep moving forward and focus on Wednesday now, see what we can get at Totton.”
Pardoe’s beautiful cross for Fletcher deserved special mention for a player who only joined the club on Friday before being handed the final 15 minutes to make a big impact from the bench.
Killick said: “It was quite a difficult situation because not long after he came on they were sitting in quite a deep block and (it was) quite hard to create things.
“The quality of the cross was exceptional and I was probably a little bit frustrated about that (overall). The quality of our set-pieces was not as good as it usually is.
“Their goalkeeper contributed to that because I thought he did really well for them in coming to get a lot of things and taking the pressure off them.”
Killick did take issue with some contentious decisions during the game, notably a second foul by Hendon’s booked midfielder Kyran Wiltshire and a soft yellow for Corby Moore.
Killick added: “The referee seemed like a nice chap but he didn’t have a very good day. He was quite erratic in his decision making.
“He set a bit of a difficult standard for himself because he booked Corby in the first half for an innocuous tackle on the halfway line.
“Pretty much every tackle after that, people are calling for yellow cards. There were yellow cards being thrown around like confetti.
“It was just a question of who was going to get the second yellow. I though (Cumberbatch) was unlucky when it happened, but perhaps it could’ve happened before.
“It was one of those games where I don’t think there was any malice at all.
“It was just a game, and referees are entitled to have them, where he’s had a difficult day and everyone can see what happened.”
Dorchester remain 17th and travel to fifth-placed AFC Totton on Wednesday (7.45pm).
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