ANOTHER poor day at the office for Otley Town saw them slip to a comprehensive 5-1 defeat at bottom club East End Park in the West Yorkshire League.

Town have an annoying habit of making life difficult for themselves, and so it proved yet again as they conceded two sloppy goals in the first ten minutes to leave themselves facing an uphill struggle to claim anything from the game.

To their credit, they battled valiantly, and were unlucky not to pull a goal back through Dan Chadwick’s attempted lob which the goalkeeper just reached, or through Harry Higgins, who clipped the crossbar with a lofted effort.

Early in the second period when Town were in the ascendancy, East End Park broke to score a third goal and that looked to have knocked the stuffing out of the away side, especially when a fourth goal was shipped soon afterwards.

Hearteningly though, Otley refused to lie down and die, and when Toby Harris pulled a goal back it gave a visible lift to all the players.

They began to take the game to their opponents, and had Tom Walker steered home a Harris cross instead of hitting the post, who knows what might have happened.

This Saturday sees Town back at home with a game against another struggling team, Brighouse Old Boys.

Otley Town were spoken to before the game about the importance of starting games better so when after ten minutes they found themselves two goals in arrears against Sherburn Reserves it was becoming apparent that the players had not listened to the team talk.

In fairness to Otley, this early set back gave them the jolt they needed to really start to play, and a good period of possession saw them hit back with an own goal.

Town continued their pressure and it was no surprise when Andrew Triggs scored a thunderbolt with only five minutes to go in the half. This was 16-year-old Triggs’ fifth goal in what is turning out to be an impressive season.

The second half started as a scrappy affair with both sides conceding possession at regular intervals with very little threatening either goalkeeper until Town managed to score a freak goal.

Adam Noble crossed in from the right with the Sherburn keeper appearing to reach the ball first only to punch it onto the back of the midfield powerhouse Ben Featherstone, who somehow bundled the ball into the back of the net.

Otley went onto score a further goal to finish the game 4-2 when Josh Lester was rewarded for his all round hard work by rounding the Sherburn keeper to slot home.

This was a better performance from Otley but improvements are needed if they are to achieve their ambition of promotion. Town take on close local rivals Pool on Saturday away from home, kick off 2pm.