East Manchester 3 Hindsford 1

NINE-MAN Hindsford suffered their third defeat of the season when they travelled to the league runners up for the past two seasons, East Manchester, on Saturday.

Rico Stewart’s opener proved too little as the Tonics’ game plan unravelled when red cards for Ryan Briody and Yarwood were followed by the hosts scoring three times.

The loss allowed Royton Town to overtake the Tonics at the top, but Hindsford maintain three games in hand on the leaders.

Luke Sylvester, returning to the starting 11, struck the crossbar from a free kick early on from 20 yards.

Jack Valentine was next to smash the woodwork, finding space in the penalty area and curling a shot towards the far post.

However, the Tonics’ game was then turned on its head as Briody raced for the ball and was adjudged to have kicked out at the covering East defender.

He was quickly shown a straight red but was adamant he had been elbowed while chasing down the ball.

After the break, Valentine, while closely marshalled by a couple of defenders, slipped a reverse pass into the East penalty area.

Stewart gathered the pass and struck a left-footed effort curling high into the corner of the net.

However, almost immediately Hindsford found themselves down to nine men.

After East were awarded a free kick near the centre circle Yarwood, already the recipient of a caution, got embroiled with East captain Neild.

The East skipper went to ground and the referee showed Yarwood a second yellow card.

Until this point, East had failed to really create any clear openings but they started to keep possession well and stretch the pitch.

They quickly took advantage of the numerical difference and Jamie Byrne bagged twice to give the hosts a lead.

A Gareth Chew free kick all but sealed the points as East raced into a 3-1 lead.

Hindsford threw Tom Valentine and David Moreno into the fray and both had decent opportunities to test the East keeper, but it was not to be and the Tonics fell to their third defeat of the season in the Manchester League Premier Division.