Gravesend & N 1 Margate 2

GRAVESEND & Northfleet manager Andy Ford was left cursing his side’s luck after they were beaten by Margate in their Nationwide Conference Kent derby at Stonebridge Road last night.

Fleet had a second-half goal harshly disallowed, before a Robert Owen own goal handed the visitors the points.

“I am going to church on Sunday because I don’t think I have deserved to have quite as much bad luck,” said Ford. “We created a little bit more than they did but came away with nothing, but I can’t praise the boys enough because there were a lot of positives out there.

“There were a few players that I would give absolutely star marks to, but unfortunately we didn’t get the result we wanted.”

Fleet made a solid start with debutant Adrian Pennock marshalling their defence to good effect and it was only because of an individual error that they fell behind midway through the half.

Keeper Jamie Turner failed to collect a Terry McFlynn corner and Sam Sodje netted from the goalmouth scramble that followed.

The home side responded positively and were deservedly back level on the half hour mark when Chris Giles rose above the visiting defence to powerfully head home Justin Skinner’s corner.

Fleet came out for the second half fired up and thought they had gone in front after 55 minutes when Giles nodded the ball home, only for the goal to be ruled out for offside.

To make matters worse, Margate got a fortuitous winner six minutes later when

Owen turned the ball into his own goal while attempting a clearance.

Margate had skipper Graham Porter sent-off for a foul five minutes from time but, although Mark Bentley went close from the resulting free-kick, the visitors held out.