MELKSHAM Town manager Richard Fey felt his side should have beaten nine-man Thatcham Town on Saturday, but insisted their 1-1 draw in Southern League Division One South was still a good point, writes JONATHAN LEIGHFIELD.

The Wiltshire outfit took the lead at the InfiLED Arena through an early Phil Ormrod goal, but had goalkeeper Jamie Bartlett to thank for going in ahead at the break after his save denied Thatcham an equaliser from the penalty spot.

In the aftermath of that miss, Thatcham’s Scott Rees was dismissed, leaving the visitors facing an uphill task to restore parity in the second 45 minutes.

Yet, despite their inferior numbers, this visitors managed to haul themselves level on the hour before goalscorer Felipe Barcelos was also given his marching orders.

Fey’s men continued to pile on the pressure for the remainder of the game, but ultimately came up empty in their pursuit of a winning goal and had to settle for a draw against the second-place team.

“It was a strange game from a manager’s point of view,” said Fey.

“We managed to keep the same team that beat Highworth the week before – that’s the first time we’ve managed to do that since I’ve been at the club – so that was nice to have a bit of consistency and stability, and as a result, we started really well.

“We went 1-0 up and Jack Ball had a great chance to make it 2-0.

“In the second half, the red cards changed the game and when you’re against nine men for the last 20 minutes, you should be winning.

“But we had a bit of a mix-up for their goal, which was their only chance in the second half.”

Melksham have endured a tough start to the season, picking up just seven points from their opening half-a-dozen league games against opponents which currently find themselves inside the top half.

The Melksham manager felt his team’s draw on Saturday was still a good one too and stressed the importance of continuing the positive momentum at the club.

Fey said: “If someone would have offered me a point against second in the league before the game, I would’ve bitten their hand off, so as far as I’m concerned, it’s a great point.

“We’re disappointed to not win the game when playing against nine men for so long of course, but they were very hard to break down.

“They had no centre forward, we had all the ball and we were just crossing or shooting off target.

“We hit the bar twice, we had easy chances to score and we’ve put them over the bar, but you get days like that.

“That’s been our luck recently, but having said that, we didn’t get beaten and we’ve got to take the positives out of it.”