Leverstock Green's bad run continued as they fell to a fourth straight defeat in Wednesday night's game at Hadley. There wasn't much wrong with the Leverstock performance, but they are having very little luck at the moment and as in their previous game they were on the wrong end of some dubious refereeing decisions.

Green manager Dene Gardner made some changes to his side in response to recent results, bringing in Warren Hall and Lewis Craze from the reserves, with two more players from the reserve side on the bench. Lee Gardner returned from injury to captain the side, but his comeback only lasted 19 minutes as he had to be replaced by Danny Arnett, making his first team debut.

Hadley had the first near miss of the game in the 23rd minute when a looping volley from Kieran Smith bounced off the top of the crossbar, but it was Leverstock who opened the scoring in the 29th minute, the first time since September 2nd that they had scored the opening goal in a match. David Sobers won the ball just outside the Hadley box, and via Liam Hind and Lewis Craze the ball found its way to Callum Wright, who crossed for Sobers to finish what he had started with a stooping header.

However, Hadley had levelled the scores before half time. Dave Pigden ran on to a through ball from Daryl Milham and slotted the ball past David Bailey for a 41st minute equaliser.

The second half opened in unfortunate fashion for Bailey, as Hadley took the lead from a free kick with less than two minutes played. Alexis Nicolas' shot was a low scuffer, but as Bailey left it, thinking it was going wide, the ball crept inside the post for a 2-1 Hadley lead.

A shot from Hind brought a good save out of the home keeper on 53 minutes, and Mark Woolley's effort on the rebound was blocked. However, Hadley found the net again on 62 minutes, this time it was a decent strike from Nicolas, a shot from outside the box which flew into the top corner and gave Bailey little chance.

Louis Bircham came off the bench on 71 minutes and within a minute had played a through ball to give Wright a great chance, but he didn't connect properly with his shot. At the other end Bailey tipped a shot from Smith over the bar five minutes later to keep Leverstock in the game.

A comeback started to look likely with 11 minutes remaining as Hind played a great pass to put Bircham in behind the Hadley defence, and Bircham produced the coolest of finishes to slot the ball under the keeper and reduce the deficit to 3-2.

Leverstock had their tails up now and they were denied a very good claim for a penalty a couple of minutes later when Wright was pulled down inside the box, and the referee waved play on. Worse was to follow in the 86th minute when Damien Cruickshank became the victim of the referee's increasing propensity for showing yellow cards and received his second to reduce the Green side to ten men.

To rub further salt in the wounds, Hadley were awarded a penalty in the first minute of stoppage time, and Pigden put it away to finally kill off the Leverstock challenge and seal a 4-2 victory for his side.

Tonight's performance showed that there is a light at the end of this tunnel of poor results, and Leverstock will hope to reach it in Saturday's home game against a St Margaretsbury side that are unusually languishing in the lower half of the table at the moment.