Spennymoor Town 2 Curzon Ashton 4.

Spennymoor manager Jason Ainsley said that he was disappointed with the way that his team folded when they were beaten 4-2 at home by Curzon Ashton on Saturday.

Moors led 2-0 at half time after a superb first half, but the dismissal of defender Chris Mason early in the second half was a major turning point, and Moors couldn’t hold on with ten men.

It was their first defeat in four league matches, but they are still nicely in fourth place in the table.

“I was disappointed with the way we lost the game,” he said. “The sending off certainly changed the game, but in the past, we’ve had players sent off and managed to cope fine. It was a contrast to our game at Southport last week when we were up against it there, but still won 2-1. We should have had bigger characters to defend the lead, for that not to happen was disappointing.

“We seemed to stop defensively, and we gave some sloppy goals away, which has been unlike us recently.

“Ironically, the first half was the best we’ve played in a long while, we were outstanding and could have been more than 2-0 up at half time. Our attacking play was superb, but unfortunately our defending wasn’t.”

Ainsley disputed the two yellows handed out to Mason.

“I couldn’t understand the sending off. For his first yellow, the referee said that Chris had gone brow-to-brow with one of their players in a fracas after another player had gone down, and that he’d booked him because he’d acted aggressively.

“For the second one, Chris went for the ball in our box, and he said that he played the ball. But instead the ref said that he fouled their man, gave a penalty and showed a second yellow. I thought the award of a penalty would have been enough in the circumstances – but there was a foul on one of our players in the build up to the penalty.”

Moors looked good for the points in the first half. They took the lead on 17 minutes when David Foley headed Brad Fewster’s cross against Curzon keeper Cameron Mason, but Mark Anderson was on hand to turn the ball home.

They were well on target for the points seven minutes later when Glen Taylor controlled a throw in, and then coolly chipped the ball over Mason from the corner of the box for an excellent goal.

It could have been more after that as Moors dominated, and Taylor hit the bar, but Curzon got back into the game three minutes into the second half when Mason was penalised for a foul in the area and shown his second yellow.

Jordan Porter blocked Niall Cummins’ penalty, but the Curzon striker was first to react and scored from the rebound.

After Taylor had a goal disallowed, Curzon levelled when Cummins scored from a knockdown with Moors static at the back, and they took the lead when Porter was penalised for bringing down Joe Guest and Cummins scored from the spot.

And the turnaround was completed on 79 minutes when Ben Wharton scored from a Richard Baker assist.

Moors: Porter, Griffiths, Mason, Tait, Chantler, Dixon, Henry, Fewster (sub Chandler 59), Anderson (sub Curtis 51), Foley (sub Hall 77), Taylor. Subs not used: Lowson, Johnson.

Attendance 745.