Billingham Town 1, Guisborough Town 0 (Ebac Northern League – Division One)

A SOLITARY late goal deep into stoppage time inflicted an unexpected defeat on high-flying Guisborough Town at the hands of local rivals Billingham Town on Saturday.

With time almost up, Billingham mounted one last attack in the 93rd minute and Jamie Davis slipped a perfect pass through to the onrushing Craig Hutchinson, who beat Guisborough 'keeper Ryan Catterick with a shot just inside the left hand post.

Despite the defeat – which ended a run of four successive league victories – Guisborough held on to third place in the league table with some rivals around them involved in FA Cup ties. The win helped Billingham climb to sixth in the table, just a point behind Guisborough.

By the end of the game Guisborough felt harshly done by with four of their players going into the referee’s book and after the final whistle with passions rising out on the field, Guisborough’s assistant manager Dave Onions was shown a red card.

Guisborough manager Gary Forster could not hide his frustration afterwards when he said: “I thought the referee’s handling of the game was very poor. I didn’t think we deserved our bookings as there wasn’t a bad tackle in the game. I found many of the referee’s decisions inexplicable.”

He added: “As far as the game itself is concerned I thought we were a little ragged in the first half and lacked discipline with our defensive shape. I thought we were the better side in the second half but got no reward for our efforts. It was great to see so many of our fans at the game and I’m just sorry that we couldn’t grab a winner for them."