REVELL’S AGONY AS BORO CRACK
NEW Stevenage boss Alex Revell thought his strugglers did enough to earn at least a point in their latest demoralising defeat at Crawley.
Goals in each half from Bez Lubala and Ashley Nadesan sentenced Boro to another loss, their seventh in a row.
They remain eight points adrift with 11 games left in their desperate fight against the drop, and the 36-year-old – who has stepped up to replace Graham Westley – said: “The second goal was a killer, but we didn’t deserve to lose.
“In patches, we showed some really good football, but one of the negatives was the final ball and all season we’ve tried to work on it.
“In the first 15 minutes of the second half you could definitely see the type of team we are. We had a golden opportunity to score and our play deserved it.”
Revell felt Boro paid a price for not scoring early in the second half and added: “The longer the game went it affected our decision-making.”
Crawley, unbeaten at home for three months, had the ball in the net early on, but Nadesan’s effort was ruled off-side.
Nadesan later forced keeper Paul Farman to save low down before firing across the face of the goal from a pass by Lubala.
Former Birmingham forward Lubala gave the Reds the lead midway through the first half with a 25-yard shot which flew in off a post.
Mason Bloomfield was denied by Farman moments later and Crawley stopper Glenn Morris kept his side ahead by pushing a goal-bound shot from Charlie Carter around the post.
Charlie Carter blazed a good chance over for Stevenage just after the break and Boro then had a let off when a shot from Ricardo German came back off a post and into the hands of Farman.
German put another shot against a post, before Nadesan sealed Crawley’s victory in the third minute of stoppage time, firing home from an unselfish pass by Lubala.
Crawley head coach John Yems admitted his men were not at their best, but felt his patched-up team deserved their victory. The Reds are now unbeaten in their last eight home games, a run spanning three months, and Yems said: “We didn’t play that well.
“We have played a lot better and got beat but we stuck at it.
“The team was a bit lopsided and it is a compliment to the boys that we never gave in. Whatever eleven are in a Crawley shirt they will give their all. We had seven players out who would have normally played.”
Crawley have finished in the bottom six three times in the previous four seasons, and Yems is seeking a much improved finish to the campaign with the Reds currently 12th.
He added: “There is always something to fight for and some players are fighting for their contracts next year.”