So City throw away two points in bizarre circumstances at the Park in front of 3082 incredulous fans on a bright and chilly afternoon. City lined up: Paul Jones; Billy Jones, Todd, Edwards, Woodards; Challinor, Gill, Buckle, Taylor; Stansfield, Phillips

It was Kidderminster who started the game brightest, and Kidderminster who forced the early pace. Their industry was rewarded as early as the second minute when City allowed Russell Penn to advance into the box unchecked, and then receive the ball without challenge. Two defenders fell over themselves attempting to shield his low drive but succeeded in merely unsighting Paul Jones who just couldn't drop quickly enough onto the ball thus gifting an easy 1-0 lead to the visitors.

Five minutes in and the first chance for City from the opening exchanges came about when an intelligent Challinor ball dinked down the left invited Phillips to give chase. Cutting in from the touchline level with the edge of the box, Phillips blazed past two defenders before letting fly a stinging drive that was deflected wide for a corner. Phillips was again involved minutes later feeding Challinor out wide. He in turn fed Stansfield who charged round the outside of a defender at lightning pace toward the goal line. Unfortunately his cut back to Phillips was smartly intercepted and hacked away to safety.

Chances became scarce as City weathered some sustained pressure - without ever really giving Jones cause for concern - but gradually the tide turned in City's favour and midway through the half Buckle delivered an inviting ball over a square defence for Stansfield to run onto after easily beating a half hearted offside trap. He raced to the goal line and fizzed the ball across the face of goal but unfortunately no-one could match his electric pace and there was no-one there to convert into an empty net from no more than six inches out.

City's now dominant play got their just desserts on 28 minutes when a sharp Billy Jones interception saw the ball poked forwards to a central Stansfield. He turned and raced toward the box delivering a delicious low cross towards the penalty spot where Billy Jones had continued his run and beat Phillips in the race to slide the ball home under the onrushing keeper for a fully deserved equaliser.

City's tails were now well and truly up, and minutes later Woodards charged down the right skipping past tackles at breakneck speed. He crossed the ball in from the edge of the box to the only other player on the team quick enough to keep up, but Stansfield's snapshot was desperately blocked at source. Stansfield had an even better chance when a free kick broke to him just inside the box, but after watching in horror as his first time smash was blocked, horror turned to disbelief as somehow the keeper palmed a rebounded drive away to safety from point blank range.

It looked as though City's somewhat purple patch was going to be rewarded further seconds later when once again Stansfield was making a nuisance of himself in the box. Spotting Jones cutting in on a clever run, he played the back to Jones who was unceremoniously upended by a clumsy challenge two feet inside the area for an obvious penalty. After dusting himself down Jones stepped up and confidently struck the ball low and hard into the centre of the goal, but despite diving to his right and missing it completely, it was a good job the keeper didn't bother to cut his toenails before the game as the ball cannoned off the end of his trailing foot and away to safety.

But City didn't let their heads drop and continued in search of the win. A smart move involving Taylor, Phillips and Challinor exchanging diagonal passes across the pitch ended with a ferocious Challinor effort from the edge of the box shot straight at the keeper, and although City continued to enjoy the lion's share of the ball, that was it as far as action went for the remaining ten minutes of the half.

With the second half in sight City were first out onto the pitch, keen to try and keep their first half dominance going. In the fourth minute Matt Gill set off on a surging run, unfortunately being shepherded further and further wide meant his shooting angle was getting tighter as he progressed, eventually giving the keeper an easy collect with nowhere left to aim at.

But the dominance was short lived, and once again chances were at a premium. The midfields cancelled each other out, defences were on top and Phillips was perpetually and infuriatingly offside. One time he wasn't almost led to a goal. On the hour Gill sent him scampering down the touchline where he delivered the most glorious cross, but not even Stansfield busting a gut to reach it in the middle could get there in time to meet it and the chance was gone.

Midway through the first half and a somewhat rare Kidderminster attack saw them reduced to ten men. Plymouth loanee Reuben Reid muscled himself into the box but then went crashing to the ground looking for a penalty. The ref was having none of it and neither was Chris Todd, who decided it warranted pointing out the error of his ways to the prone Reid. Not entirely in agreement with the Todd version of events, Reid countered with how he saw things, feigning to butt Todd, who for the first time in the incident decided to show maturity and wisdom in backing away. But the ref had seen enough and decided the intent was there so it was an early bath for the somewhat cranially challenged one.

Surely now though City would go on to claim all three points, and moments after the sending off Stansfield looked to try and do exactly that, nipping back into his own half to steal the ball away from a potential cross into City box and bursting down the Old Grandstand touchline. As he surged goalwards, he was forced wider than he would have liked and was unfortunate to end up with too narrow an angle to aim at and thus his cross/shot was comfortably plucked from the air.

Inexplicably, and amidst boos from three sides of the ground, Stansfield was withdrawn for Mackie with fifteen minutes to go. So was our fizz, our guile, our drive and our pace. Until Moxey replaced the non stop hard working as usual Taylor ten minutes later, taking Challinor's left side spot with Challinor moving to the right, we looked as though we would have to settle for a draw. Kidderminster certainly had, especially after losing a man almost 20 minutes earlier.

Billy Jones still wanted to atone for his freakish penalty miss though, and with seven minutes remaining launched in an inswinging corner from the right. It was easily cleared, but only back to Jones who ghosted past a defender and unleashed and arrow straight thunderbolt that the keeper clawed away from under his crossbar. It wasn't all City in the closing exchanges though, and Todd had to remain alert in the final minute when a Kidderminster forward burst into the box only for Todd to execute a perfect sliding challenge to divert the ball to safety just as the striker shaped to shoot.

But what a strange game for many reasons. Firstly, I don't think I've seen so many crosses delivered where there's been no-one on hand to even get a strike away let alone score. I suppose that most of them came from man of the match Stansfield when precious few can match his electric pace could account for it, but playing his best game for the club since his arrival - according to manager Tisdale on the radio later - it seems bizarre that he should be the player withdrawn when everything good up front was coming from him and not the permanently, it seemed, offside Phillips. Prematch Reid, being an Argyle buay, had professed his desire to play in today's fixture, but to be honest he didn't do an awful lot and I'm not so sure his manager would be entirely happy that his sign of being up for it was to get himself needlessly sent off.

Speaking of the sending off, I'm not so sure Chris Todd entirely covered himself in glory either. The ref had no inclination whatsoever of being coerced into giving a penalty for the dive, so Todd didn't need to give Reid his five pence worth and therefore inflaming a situation that didn't need to exist in the first place.

As for the players, well once again Jones did little wrong in goal. He was untroubled for the whole game bar their goal, but I don't think he could have done much given the way the two defenders blocked his view of events. The full backs played a lot better than last weekend's FA Cup defeat, and Billy Jones scored a fine goal and was unlucky to see his penalty saved. Woodards made his now customary barnstorming runs down the right, and surely it won't be long before he opens his City account.

In midfield Challinor once again showed skill, class and strength. Fading a bit in the second half due to his efforts in the first, he is overdue a goal that his recent performances surely deserve. Also deserving of praise is the unsung work of Paul Buckle in the middle. One time (and undeservedly) crowd boo-boy, his tough tackling approach compliments the passing artistry of Gill.

Up front was definitely a tale of two strikers. Phillips has had better games, of that there's no doubt, but after his billionth unnecessary offside and Stansfield's bubbly, mazy, crazy, twinkle-toed, non stop, poetry in motion display of zippy attacking play, it was frankly unbelievable that it was Stansfield who was withdrawn for Mackie. I suppose you could say it was like-for-like, but it was almost a crime to prevent Stansfield from finishing the match given the performance he was giving.

But I think it wrong to end on a negative, and as Tisdale said in his post match interview, some of the passing was fantastic and at times we looked a very good side indeed. I'd rather we played like we did today creating bucket loads of chances from goodness knows how many crosses than resorting to last season's at times turgid Viney-esque hoofs upfield all the time.

If we can turn domination into chances and chances into goals then we've got a very good chance of being up there when it matters at the end of the season. You can all see how that begins to pan out when we're on the telly at Burton a week on Monday before we return to the Park for the visit of Dagenham in three weeks time. Daggers are right up there chasing Oxford, and we should be well rested and champing at the bit to get back into action after a long lay-off, so that game should give a good indication as to how suited we are to life in the heady heights of the play-offs. You can't really think of anywhere you'd rather be, can you, especially as it'll be the last home game before the busy Christmas period, so give yourself an early present and get along to the Park and cheer the lads on.