Carlisle City drew 1-1 with West Auckland in the Northern League in what proved to be a controversial contest.
Both goals came in the last five minutes and during that time City also had Dan Kirkup sent-off – a significant red card for the player.
It was his third dismissal of the season which will mean a five match ban but occurred in bizarre circumstances.
He had been sin-binned for querying why a Carlisle goal had been disallowed and then while walking round the ground City did equalise. He joined in the celebrations and received a red card.
City had three goals disallowed for off-side during the game and the West Auckland goal came in circumstances which no-one attending could ever recall happening.
Jordan Palmer had gone past two defenders to reach a knock-down and tap home from five yards. There was no flag for offside and while the whole team was celebrating in the corner apart from the goalkeeper some 30 to 40 seconds elapsed.
The referee then consulted his linesman, disallowed the goal and from the free-kick the West Auckland keeper hammered it forward to four or five players on the halfway line and they ran on unopposed to beat the keeper with the rest of the City players back in the opposition half.
Fortunately City did find an equaliser in the time that remained but events of the afternoon had left a sour taste.
City felt they had scored a perfectly good goal earlier, too, when one of their players had been hurt in the process. He was receiving treatment when again the referee spoke to his assistant, after receiving no flag.
A number of West Auckland players had surround the linesman, complaining about the goal and eventually the referee disallowed it some four minutes after the ball had hit the net.
Manager Jim Nichols said: “I feel absolutely gutted for my players. They dominated the game and deserved all three points but what happened was something I haven’t seen in over 20 years.
“The fact that we will now lose Dan for five matches just added to the sense of frustration and bitter disappointment.
“We go to Newcastle Benfield next on Saturday, which will be tough, but if we show the same spirit and determination I’m sure we will be fine.”
James Ellis scored the bizarre West Auckland goal after 85 minutes and Jordan Palmer netted the equaliser two minutes later.
