Mullets rue their luck after Lingfield defeat

With the scores level at 0-0 on 29 minutes, they lost James Wotherspoon to illness and within two minutes the man he was marking had fired the visitors ahead.

In conceding Daryl Coleman’s strike, Arundel goalkeeper James Fernandes trapped a nerve in his back and centre-back Adam Bibb was forced to take over in goal.

Arundel soon got back on level terms as Rory Biggs netted on 40 minutes, but Lingfield’s Jay Kalama netted a quick brace before half-time.

After the break, Mullets’ Scott Tipper went through one-on-one, but was foiled by a fine save and from the resulting break Lingfield’s Hidekazu Sato added a fourth, and, 60 seconds later, on 52 minutes, he wrapped up the scoring for the visitors.

Butler said: “I am not looking for excuses, but myself and Craig (Stuart) have said to each other, when is our luck going to change?

“We started brilliantly and in the first 15 minutes had a really good chance go narrowly wide. James then had to come off ill on 29 minutes and within two minutes the bloke he was marking had scored.

“In that goal, James, our keeper, got injured and had to be carried off and we did not have anyone else to go in goal.

“Adam Bibb stuck his hand up as he’s played a bit of six-a-side in goal.

“We showed good character to get a goal back and we were thinking going in at 1-1 at half-time would be good and we could rejig things, but they scored two goals in two minutes. For one, the marking wasn’t great and you can’t blame Adam at all, but maybe with James in goal he may have saved them.

“They knew Adam wasn’t a goalkeeper and they did what we would have done, put balls into the box and tested him.”

Arundel travel to East Grinstead on Saturday, who sit a place above them in the table, and Mullets hope to have Bradley Lewis in their squad after putting in a seven-day approach for the East Preston player, who is dual-signed at Crawley Down Gatwick.