‘Lessons to be learned’ - Eastwood CFC bosses

Tyler Blake and Marcus Marshall had put Eastwood 2-0 up before the visitors fought back to deservedly make progress.

But the management team were left frustrated by what they’d seen.

Thomas told the club’s social media channels: “It was poor, and we’ve got to apologise to the Eastwood fans. Today’s result is on us. After a tough game last week we trusted the lads and gave them Wednesday night off, but we were nowhere near good enough in our tempo or intensity.

"We missed endless chances and our defending was powder-puff again – I’m sick of talking about the same things when we’re losing games.

"Credit to Easington, they wanted it more than us.”

Ball added: “We didn’t have any tempo and when we went 2-0 up we took our foot off the pedal. We got what we deserved – if we’d played with any tempo we’d have won the game but we didn’t and lessons will be learned.”

Eastwood travelled to face AFC Mansfield in the league on Wednesday night, after this week’s Advertiser had gone to press.

Attention then turns to an important clash at Skegness Town on Saturday, with the home side also very much in the play-off mix.

That will be followed by a home clash with Kimberley MW in the Notts Senior Cup on Wednesday (18th).

Meanwhile, Eastwood have added central defender Stern Irvine to their ranks.

The 20-year-old, who lists Notts County, Ilkeston Town, Basford United and most recently Melton Town as his former clubs, has linked up with the Red Badgers on a permanent basis.

Joint-manager Thomas said: “I am delighted to get TJ (Stern) over the line.

"We have made no secret over the last few weeks that we need to be better defensively so when the opportunity presented itself we couldn’t turn it down - between Rom, Tyreece and TJ we have a really solid foundation at centre-back, now we have to figure out which two are going to take us to the next level.”