Keynsham Town 1

Shepton Mallet 0

After doing neighbours Wells a favour in midweek by winning at second-placed Odd Down, Shepton missed a great chance to deliver another shock result at fourth-placed Keynsham after the home side had a player dismissed midway through the first half.

Keynsham had gone in front two minutes earlier, but Shepton rarely threatened to take advantage of their extra man in a generally disappointing game.

Keynsham, who tend to play a long ball game, enjoyed territorial advantage early on, with Shepton's Pete Applegate twice prominent in clearing dangerous balls into the box.

The first of few saves that Shepton keeper Liam MacFarlane had to make came from a Josh Dyer shot for Keynsham after 15 minutes, and three minutes later the visitors were fortunate when the same player had a goal ruled out for pushing, a decision that some officials would not have given.

Their luck only lasted another couple of minutes, however, as Ross MacNab met a right-wing cross with a firm header to beat MacFarlane and put his side in front.

An alert linesman then spotted an off-the-ball incident involving Keynsham's Luke Lipinski and, after reviewing the incident with his colleague, the referee showed the distraught player a red card for a raised arm offence.

On 30 minutes, Shepton missed a great chance to equalise after Dave Burborough got his head to an Applegate free-kick and set-up Matt Crouch, only for Crouch to mis-hit his shot from four yards out.

After Keynsham goal scorer MacNab went close to adding his and his team's second, the last chance of the half fell to Brad Allen, whose header from a fine Rob Banfield cross went tamely wide.

With Keynsham content to protect their single-goal advantage and Shepton huffing and puffing with little penetration themselves, the second half was easily forgettable.

Few Shepton players could have been happy with their performances on the day, with only midfielder Richard Healey playing to his potential.

Shepton have three matches in eight days, starting with a re-arranged game on Saturday away to Chard Town (3pm). They then, unusually, have a home game on Thursday, March 18 against Bridport (7.30pm), before visiting Clevedon United a week on Saturday.

This year's annual meeting has been scheduled for Sunday, April 25 at 6pm in the West Shepton clubhouse.