A controversial refereeing decision had a hand in the outcome of more than one contest on Saturday: if Wales fans couldn’t believe their eyes in the morning, Ks manager Alan Dowson was left scratching his head in the afternoon after midfielder Bashiru Alimi was sent off and then Hornchurch's opening goal of a 3-0 win was allowed to stand despite Martin Tuohy blatantly handling the ball before scoring.

When defender Lynvall Duncan attempted to clear the ball out of the area in the 65th minute, it clearly struck Tuohy’s raised arm, giving the striker the perfect chance to clumsily lift a shot into the net via his left thigh. Ball to hand? Dowson was having none if it. “It's a handball,” the manager said afterwards. “No doubt about it. We looked comfortable at 0-0 and the referee’s cost us the game..”

One-nil up and one-man up, the Urchins started to stretch the visitors. Lewis Smith made it two five minutes later, getting in behind a ball-watching Duncan to strike home after a 20-pass move. And the unmarked Frankie Curley sealed the win in the 71st minute, rolling the ball into an empty net.

If not a tragedy of World Cup-losing proportions, the defeat is nonetheless a setback after Ks seemed to have got their season back on track with 9 points picked up at home in recent weeks. They had one significant chance in Saturday, Ali Chaaban failing to hit the ball cleanly after being put through by Bobby Traynor’s trickery. “We had a good little run the last three games and we need to get on another run,” said Dowson. “There's 31 games to go.”

As for Alimi’s red card, while there could be few complaints about the second booking that led to the dismissal, a late and reckless lunge, Dowson is adamant the first-half yellow was unwarranted. “The second tackle was a booking, but the first one wasn't. The referee knew he made a mistake on the first booking. And one of their players went in on Tom Bird in exactly the same way and he never even said a word.

“The FA talks about respect for referees but I want to get a campaign going: Respect Football Managers.”