Walsall Wood 4, Malvern Town 1

Malvern Town went into this Banks's Brewery League Premier Division fixture on the back of a six match unbeaten run and felt confident this would be extended against the league's bottom side, still in search of its first victory.

Town though had to pinch themselves when they were trailing by three goals after just 17 minutes!

The first strike came in only the second minute when Town failed to clear a corner, allowing the ball to fall to an unmarked home player who slotted past Sanders from the edge of the six yard box.

Ten minutes later Town conceded an unnecesary free kick on the edge of the penalty area which Sanders chose to punch rather than gather, and in doing so simply presented a grateful home side with another simple tap-in opportunity.

In the 17th minute things got worse for Town when an excellent strike from the edge of the box went in off the far post, giving Sanders no chance.

On a cabbage patch of a pitch, Town had tended to control things and had most of the possesion, forcing a number of corners and goalscoring opportunities.

The second period saw Town totally in control, but the trend was no different from the first as Town, who had scored ten goals in their previous three games and and conceded only two, had clearly left their shooting boots at home.

Congrave, Ward and Slade all might have reduced the decefit.

Inevitably it was the home side which struck in the 81st minute when Town's offside trap broke down and presented the Walsall with a fourth breakaway goal.

Immediatly after this Towns miserable afternoon took a turn for the worse when Martin Phillpotts was dismissed for an alledged strike at a home player.

In the 86th minute Sean Cotterill eventually found a way past the Walsall defence when he headed home a Steve Walker cross, but it was scant consolation for Town on a thoroughly miserable afternoon.

Town assistant manager, Richard Anson, said: "I do not think anybody could believe what went on in the first 20 minutes, not even the home side themselves. But they took the opportunities we presented them with and from then on we knew we were facing a massive task to get back into the game.

"To be fair we generally controlled things after this and had a lot of possesion, particuarly in the second half, but overall the team did not function with the conviction it had shown in the past few games and for one of those unfathomable reasons just about everybody had an off day".

Malvern Town: Sanders, Higgins, Cotterill, Hayes, Clayton (Walker), Sharma (Thomas), Ward, Maidment, Phillpotts, Slade, Congrave (Shepherd).