Cheadle Town 1-2 Alsager Town

The bitterest of pills to swallow.

With just two minutes to go Alsager's Remeece Brown took off on a gallop towards our goal, twisted this way and that before opening his body up and placing a well-taken effort past Ryan Allcock.

Such a shame and all as we had done everything to haul ourselves back into the match in the second half - after a rather indifferent first - and can probably count ourselves a tad unlucky not to come away with at least a point.

That first half.

From a Cheadle point of view probably the less said about it the better. With only an early Rick Whyatt effort and a Rob Brocklehurst free-kick - both of which were straight at the keeper - to speak of we really didn't get going and offered little in terms of troubling the Alsager keeper.

Down the other end the first real significant effort on goal after a turgid 19 minutes saw Alsager go ahead thanks to a Joshua Glover looping header from a left-wing cross and Ryan Allcock doing very well to tip away a curling effort on 35 minutes.

He made one more decent stop early in the second half before the introduction of Luke Hincks gave us a bit more bite on the pitch.

This paid dividends on 69 minutes. James Dunn's run down the right into the box resulted in him shovelling the ball into the area for Mike Sherrington to finally - after a bit of persistence - prod home for a deserved leveller.

Mike was then through again on 76 minutes but the pace of the ball - and the keeper - thwarted him with George Clarey then through in a similar situation on 80 minutes with the keeper being equal to matters once more.

Neither team were settling for a draw, so who would win it? Unfortunately for us Alsager won that particular toss of the coin.

A cheerless result but still plenty of promise. Again, as it was in Atherton over the weekend, patience played a part. We stuck to our guns re our manner and style of play against a robust Alsager outfit and it (almost) paid off.

Two matches in. No major concerns as yet. Can't complain.

TEAM: Allcock, Dunn, Fleming, Brocklehurst (Delaney), Harrison, Shaw, Ambrose, Wood (Hincks), C Sherrington (Clarey), Whyatt, M Sherrington. SUBS: Piggott (gk), Hincks, Clarey, Delaney.