Workington Red Sox 1-1 Chester FC - Match Mill

Chester FC went all the way to Workington last night and only brought home a point, even though we all had to be up for work this morning.

Despite the fact that it would have been far more decent of the Blues to reward their travelling fans with a performance akin to those seen in the Droylesden and Stalybridge hammerings, Chester failed to beat the Red Sox, despite the hosts only having ten men for most of the game, after their defender Lee Andrews decided that even he couldn't be bothered with the late night and got himself sent off for sneaking a piggy back on Nathan Jarman without warning the former Grimsby man first.

Marc Williams eventually helped the Seals into the lead with a diving header but the visiting side, accustomed to bookies paying up way before their job is done, figured their bets were safe and sat on their laurels before watching as Workington got back on level terms through Gari Rowntree.

"He could have at least given me some fruit pastilles to soften the blow," grumbled Blues keeper John Danby.  "I even like the green ones."

Chester's failure to win is not a disaster however, as Guiseley also slipped up again and everyone else is so far off the pace that they might as well be in a different league altogether.  That includes you, Halifax.

News broke after the game that top scorer Ben Mills is to exit the club on loan for a month to Altrincham.  This has met with a mixed reaction rather than with outright rage, confirming that manager Neil Young has now reached a position where his decisions have been so uniformly brilliant in his three years in charge that he can pretty much get away with anything now.

"Yeah, we signed Ben, then asked you for money to fund it, and now we've turfed him out to Alty and replaced him with a short-term option in Lee Trundle.  I mean, sure, we could have given Ben - as a long-term investment - a run in our team to get his form back.  He's not even played alongside the team's real creative force Marc Williams since he's been back at the club, after all.  But the fact is, we've only got a 16 point gap to play with, so we can't afford to be fielding players who were netting better than a goal a game only a few months ago," explained Young.

Chester now look forward to a game against Vauxhall Motors on Saturday, with the club still trying to secure a deal to sign Craig Curran for several thousand pounds and send him off to play for Bishop's Stortford, before the board looks all nonplussed and asks where all the money's gone again.