Missed penalties, red cards and Doswell’s shoot-out woes – it’s deja vu all round as Hawks’ Wembley dream is shattered by Notts County

On an eventful afternoon, after the teams had shared four goals and two red cards in an entertaining fifth round tie, it was the higher division Magpies who advanced into the quarter finals via the lottery of penalties.

Though Jim O’Brien fired his opening penalty for the visitors against a post, Craig Robson and Aryn Williams both saw their efforts saved by Luke Pilling diving to his right as Notts claimed a 4-2 victory.

Any students of recent non-league history would not have been remotely surprised it ended this way.

For home boss Paul Doswell, it was the latest in a string of penalty shoot-out losses he had overseen stretching back 15 years

Not for the first time in the manager’s Hawks career, failure to convert from 12 yards cost his side dearly.

And certainly not for the first time in recent months, Hawks’ propensity of failing to keep all 11 players on the pitch was also a potential factor in their exit.

Doswell said afterwards he had lost every single shoot-out since starting his managerial career at Eastleigh.

This was his third Trophy loss on spot-kicks - Eastleigh losing to AFC Wimbledon in 2006/07 and Sutton crashing out to Wingate & Finchley in his first season at Gander Green Lane in 2008/09.

In 2017/18, Sutton also lost to Slough Town on penalties in the FA Cup while in 2018/19 they were the answer to this unusual quiz question - which English club lost a Scottish Cup tie in Ireland?

In October 2018, Sutton drew 0-0 in Dublin with Bohemians in the Scottish Challenge Cup. Leading 3-2 on spot-kicks, they then missed three in a row to crash out.

Bizarrely, that season’s Challenge Cup included two teams from the Republic of Ireland, two from Northern Ireland, two from Wales and two English non-league clubs.

The News can reveal that Doswell did win one shoot-out during his time at Sutton, but as it was against Corinthian Casuals in January 2013 in the Surrey Senior Cup - ex-Hawks keeper Kevin Scriven his side’s hero - we will excuse him forgetting that one!

The manager’s woeful history of penalty misses has followed him to Westleigh Park since his arrival in May 2019.

Last season, four different players missed from the spot - Roarie Deacon, Simon Walton, Anthony Straker and Danny Kedwell. The first two failed from 12 yards in goalless home draws with Eastborne and Chelmsford; those extra four points would have seen Hawks top of the table by a point when the season was halted last March. Such are the slim margins that separate success from failure.

This season, Bedsente Gomis had missed a penalty in Hawks’ last outing prior to Notts’ visit, in a 2-1 NL South defeat at Bath on January 19. Both Robson’s and Williams’ spot-kicks were more firmly struck than Gomis’ was at Twerton Park, but the end result was still the same.

Kedwell and Straker were among the subs Doswell could have brought on in the dying seconds with penalties firmly in mind. An easy subject to bring up post-match, armed with the benefit of hindsight, but the boss said players taking spot-kicks ‘cold’ could have backfired.

Of course, the Trophy tie might not have gone to penalties had Hawks managed to keep 11 players on the pitch.

They were fairly comfortable at 2-1 up with 20 minutes remaining when debutant Nico Jones was penalised for pulling the shirt of Notts sub Tyreace Palmer as he attempted to get on the end of a Ruben Rodrigues free kick.

Though Palmer headed wide, referee Sunny Gill awarded Notts a penalty and showed Jones his second yellow - he had previously been booked for a foul just before half-time.

Doswell was annoyed that his side had been victims of a ‘double jeopardy’ ruling. ‘We were punished twice,’ he rued.

Jones’ red card was Hawks’ fifth this season and maintained their sorry habit of picking up dismissals in big games.

The run started last July, when Josh Taylor was sent off for retaliation in the play-off semi-final with Dartford. Leading at the time and looking comfortable, Hawks ended up losing 2-1.

When the two clubs met again in the league in October, Billy Clifford was red carded in Hawks’ 2-1 defeat.

They managed to hold out for a 1-0 FA Cup first round win against two divisions lower Cray after Godfrey Poku was dismissed for a second yellow.

In the following round, Anthony Straker saw red towards the end of normal time in the shock loss at Marine.

Not long after, George McLennan was shown a straight red in the first half of a 0-0 home league stalemate with Slough.

Had Jones stayed on, Hawks could well have celebrated a famous win and a place in the quarter-finals of the Trophy for only the fourth time in their 23-year history.

And make no mistake, it would have been a famous success.

Ok, it wasn’t the Magpies first choice XI - boss Neal Ardley, as expected, rotated his squad - regular keeper Sam Slocombe, skipper Michael Doyle and top scorer Kyle Wootton were all given the day off.

But Ardley still named a strong bench and was able to introduce regular 1st XI wingers Enzo Boldewijn and Rodrigues midway through the second period.

A closer look at the Hawks team is also necessary.

Due to self-isolations and the National League’s two-week suspension of the sixth tier, Hawks had only played three games in 48 days ahead of Notts’ visit.

McLennan was recalled at left back for his first outing since being sent off on December 8 - almost two months earlier.

Clifford was given only his second start since December 15 – ‘he ran the show’ praised Doswell - while Jones also hadn’t played since early December when he turned out for Oxford in an EFL Trophy tie.

With regular No 1 Ross Worner nursing an injured shoulder, Joe Tupper was handed only his second competitive Hawks start - he had previously only played in the Trophy at two tiers lower Bracknell in December.

In addition, Hawks were handicapped by an early knee injury to captain Godfrey Poku. On came another new recruit, Aryn Williams, who was playing his first competitive game since an outing in the Indonesian League last March!

Given the player’s lack of game time, it was a slight gamble by Doswell who had two other midfielders, Theo Widdrington and Christian Rowe, on the bench as well. The manager wanted an experienced head, though, and Williams responded well; he certainly didn’t look like he hadn’t played for the best part of a year.

The Trophy tie was Hawks’ 20th game of the 2020/21 season. Who knows how many more they will have left? But I’ve seen 12 of those matches and the Notts performance, when you consider everything I’ve just mentioned and the standard of the opposition, was easily one of the best in that time.

In the previous two league games, losses to Eastbourne and Bath, Hawks looked all over the place at times in defence, especially early on. This was a far, far better display and set a bar for the next few months, providing the season continues (and there is absolutely no guarantee of that at present).

‘Overall everyone put in a really good shift,’ praised Doswell.

‘It’s difficult when you haven’t played and you haven’t trained. If you don’t play any sport for a period of time it’s very difficult, but you wouldn’t have known that today. Our team looked like they had been playing the same as Notts County.

‘I’m very proud of the team, I can’t give them enough credit.’