Spennymoor Town 1 Rushall Olympic 1.

Spennymoor manager Jason Ainsley admitted that his team has made life difficult for themselves after they wasted a great opportunity to strengthen their hold on second place by drawing 1-1 with Rushall Olympic on Saturday.

Moors missed a penalty, some good chances and gifted Rushall an equaliser, to leave them with just a one point advantage in second place as they head for a tricky away game at lowly Frickley on Monday afternoon. They’re just about guaranteed a play off place, but second spot ensures them home advantage throughout the play offs.

“We certainly make life hard for ourselves,” said Ainsley.

“We must have had 90 per cent of possession, created lots of chances, but could only score once. When we did score, a minute later we gave away a daft free kick, our keeper and a defender collided, and they scored.

“The missed chances came back to bite us, and now we’ve got even more work to do. We need to grind out a good result at Frickley, so then we can stay in second, but even then, it’s not in our hands now because Nantwich can overtake us with their game in hand.”

Moors’ tale of woe began on 21 minutes when Mark Anderson was brought down by Rushall keeper Jose Veiga in the area, but Anderson put the spot kick well over the bar.

Moors then put together some good pressure before half time, but Veiga twice denied Graeme Armstrong and also Anderson, who missed another opportunity from a good position.

In the second half, Veiga saved a Kallum Griffiths free kick, and the breakthrough finally came on 69 minutes when Glen Taylor fired a left foot shot into the top corner.

But within a minute, Rushall were level when keeper Dan Lowson and defender Chris Mason collided, and the ball spilled out for Lewis Probert to tap in.

Rob Ramshaw nearly won it with a good shot, but in the last minute Lowson made an excellent save from a Stan Mugisha effort.

Team: Lowson, Griffiths, Mason, Chandler, Baldwin, Curtis, Ramshaw, Henry (sub Fisher), Taylor, Armstrong (sub Dowson), Anderson (sub Johnson).

Subs not used; Mitchell, Watson.

Attendance 578.

Ainsley will probably choose from a full squad today, although defender Joe Tait will have a fitness test.

Blyth, who have already won the title, drew 1-1 at Ashton United, Nathan Buddle scoring the goal.

Whitby dropped out of the play offs because they were held to a 2-2 draw at home by Warrington, Dale Hopson scoring both their goals.