Saturday 14 December 2002 - Crabble Athletic Ground - kick off 3.00pm Dr Martens Premier Division

City began the game with a side showing two changes to the Welling defeat - loan striker Matt Lewis starting his first game with Paul Milsom dropping back into midfield in place of Jamie Gosling and Gary Kemp replacing the injured Chris Honor at the back. After a non-descript opening ten minutes (which was fine as I was more interested in the excellent bacon roll served at the ground) City began to pass the ball around neatly and look the more likely to break the deadlock. The first chance saw Jason Eaton fire over from long range and then he just failed to get a decisive touch on Milsom's downward header. After 19 minutes Milsom did get the ball into the net however even a Doc Martens standard referee couldn't fail to have noticed his push on keeper Hyde so the 'goal' was ruled out. The home side's only response during this period saw Spiller slice a shot well wide from Norman's cross but against the run of play on the half hour they took the lead. Carruthers made ground down the right flank only to be forced inside where he laid the ball off to Day. City's defence stood off and the midfielder took the opportunity to send an unstoppable 25-yard past Bryant. So, City's keeper first real involvement in the game was to pick the ball out of the net. Despite this undeserved set-back City did not let their heads drop. Two minutes before the interval Andy Williams produced his one telling moment of the game, leaving three defenders in his wake before slipping a pass through to Lewis. The Kidderminster man only had Hyde to beat but his well-struck shot was turned away by the Dover keeper. Before the break the keeper was called into action again, collecting Eaton's header from a trademark Gary Thorne long throw.

The second period began in a similar manner with City belying their poor recent run by taking the game to their hosts. Frankie Bennett's strong run ended with Lewis mis-hitting his shot on 51 minutes. Four minutes later Bennett's free-kick found the head of Eaton only for his looping header to bounce off the bar into the grateful arms of Hyde. This latest piece of bad luck for City seemed to drain their confidence away and suddenly Dover looked threatening every time their attacked. Fortunately for City the chances they did create mostly fell to Tyne. The striker's first miss came on 61 minutes after he ran onto a long ball forward. He cut inside Kemp to leave himself with just Bryant to beat only to scuff a feeble shot straight at the orange clad keeper. Bryant had to be alert to prevent Trought adding to the increasing tally of City own goals six minutes later before Tyne blasted another great opening over with eleven minutes remaining. Despite the introduction of Stuart James, Gosling and Dan Cleverley City still couldn't lift their game back up to early levels. Tyne completed a hat-trick of misses after 82 minutes but in stoppage time he was finally presented with a chance ever he couldn't fluff. Bryant's understandably hurried clearance was headed back toward him by Davies. Before he could make amends Tyne was onto him and in the ensuing scramble the Dover player managed to stab the ball toward the unguarded net 40 yards away and to the watching agony of the City players it just had enough momentum to carry it over the line.