AFC Fylde boss Dave Challinor looks on bright side after rare league defeat

But Challinor says defensive mistakes condemned his Fylde side to just their second league defeat of the season.

“It’s three individual errors for the goals,” he said. “We knew against the better sides we’ve got to defend well and we’ve had the plaudits for that this season ...but not here. We’ve been punished for the mistakes we’ve made.

“The first goal, in my opinion, is an individual mistake by the referee. I think there’s a blatant foul that’s not given. That happening so early in the game could have been critical.

“In many ways it probably settled us down after looking a little edgy in the opening 10 minutes. But from that point on, first half especially, I thought we were fantastic and played some good stuff.

“We get the equaliser and continued to get ourselves into some good positions but we weren’t hitting the target. Nevertheless we were in control of the game.

“We’ve been done with a sucker punch just before half-time through some bad defending. To be fair to their lad (Josh Koroma), it’s a great finish but defensively it’s really, really poor.

“It saw us go in behind and ultimately we couldn’t recover from that. But I gave a positive team talk at half-time because I felt that if we carried on doing what we were doing we would get opportunities.

“That proved to be the case but we knew we’d have to defend well at the other end, and two individual mistakes have allowed them to get their third.

“They then manage the game really well. We needed a goal to get back in it and change the momentum, but they defended well and their keeper (Dean Brill) has made a couple of great saves.

“We couldn’t turn the tide but by no means is there total negativity.

“If they’re the benchmark, then I’m pretty pleased with where we’re at.

“I hate losing but there are plenty of positives to take from the defeat.”