It’s a frustrating night to reflect on because I genuinely believe we should have taken something from that game — and probably all three points — and instead we come away empty-handed.
I thought, for long stretches, especially after the opening period, that was the best we’ve played in the last eight or nine weeks.
But football has a way of punishing you when you don’t take your chances, and that’s exactly what happened to us.
We created enough. That’s the simple truth.
At 1–0 up, we’ve got a really good one-on-one that we don’t finish.
Straight after half-time, we miss another big opportunity.
We’ve had moments in and around the penalty area where we either shoot when we should pass, or don’t quite get the final action right.
And at this level, those moments matter.
The game ultimately gets decided in those details.
What makes it more frustrating is that I can’t fault the effort.
The lads worked hard, they tried to play, and there was a lot of good stuff in our build-up.
We’ve been working on certain patterns and principles over the last couple of weeks, and I could see them starting to come through.
That part is encouraging, even if the result doesn’t feel like it right now.
But in the first 10–15 minutes of the second half, we were a bit off it — a bit nervous, not quite on the pace.
After that, I thought we controlled large parts of the game again.
Then we concede from distance, and to be fair to them, it’s a very good strike.
The second one is similar — another quality hit from outside the box.
Both goals are preventable in the sense that we can defend those situations better.
We can get out quicker, we can close space earlier, and we can stop giving good players the time to set themselves.
But you also have to acknowledge quality when it’s there, and they punished us with two really clean finishes.
That said, I don’t think they created a lot beyond that.
Most of their threat came in those early stages and then from range.
The rest of the time, I felt we had control, just without the final product.
There were moments in the box where we needed a bit more composure — maybe a bit more awareness of a better option.
Sometimes as a striker or an attacking player, you want to be the one who finishes it, and I understand that.
But there were times where a simple square pass would have given us a tap-in rather than a rushed shot.
Those are the decisions we have to keep improving.
I won’t spend too much time on refereeing decisions.
There were a couple of moments where we felt things might have gone our way, maybe a penalty shout or two, but that’s part of the game.
Officials have a tough job and we have to deal with what’s in front of us.
Ultimately, we had enough chances to win it ourselves.
The disappointment for me is that it ends our winning run, because we’ve been building something and showing progress.
Sometimes you lose and you accept the opponent was better — I’ve said that before and I will again — but tonight feels different.
Tonight feels like a game we’ve let slip.
We move on quickly because we have another tough one coming against Moreton City Excelsior away on Saturday.
We’re playing a side that knows how to win and has improved significantly since we last met them.
Every game at this level is a challenge, especially away from home.
The focus now is simple: keep the good parts of our performance, sharpen the decision-making in the final third, and make sure that when we’re on top in games like this, we turn it into results.
