And the opening exchanges seemed to back up these changes as City took the game to their opponents. Their neat passing, in contrast to the optimistic long ball game they had resulted to lately, threatened to find a way through the Tamworth defence, although only when Wyatt latched onto a Thorne long throw did a goal look possible. And with almost a sad predicatbility from their first attack of the game Tamworth scored. A long pass forward looked to have been comfortably dealt with by City's defence but as Hervin and Thorne appeared to leave it for each other Hallam stole in and rolled the ball into the unguarded net. Boosted by this break the home side suddenly threatened to take the game away from City. Just two minutes later Foy should have done better when Hervin failed to gather a Colley cross, and then Roberts fired into the side netting after a strong run by Mutchell. However, on 20 minutes another goal against the run of play saw City level. Milsom began the move that gave Foster a shooting chance. His low left foot shot beat Acton and struck the inside of the post and rolled along the goalline and, as the keeper fell onto it, the linesman signalled that the ball had crossed the line. Any doubt over the legality of the goal was forgotten in the celebrations and City were back in the game. They had a great chance to take the lead when Acton was adjudged to have handled outside his area when launching a long throw up field, but MacLean fired the free-kick high over the bar. The half closed with both sides having a goal ruled out by the linesman flag - Foster the unfortuante victim for City.

After what had been a reasonably entertaining first period the interval seemed to knock both sides out of their stride and for long periods the play was scrappily confined to the middle of the park, with only an off target shot by Roberts ever threatening either goal. During this spell with a number of refereeing decisions going against the home side the game had threatened to boil over and on 75 minutes it finally did. The incident began when Acton was again penalised for handling outside his area. As City attempted to get the ball back players on both sides were involved in minor scuffles. When order was restored City's Harvey received a caution as did, to the amazement of everyone, Acton, but as play was about to restart the linesman flag brought the referee's attention to a comment made by Grocutt and he was shown the red card. Again City wasted the free-kick, Powell this time firing it over the bar. Tamworth were now content to sit back and defend their point and, with City looking reluctant to commit too many men forward in search of the victory, neither side created a clear cut chance to snatch the win. City did bring on Keen for his debut a minute after the sending off but, despite a few neat touches, he couldn't help City break their duck.