Blyth manager Harry Dunn gave his skipper Peter Snowdon 'the elbow' at half-time in the Spartans' game against Hucknall on Saturday, withdrawing the defender and replacing him with Steve Birks.

Almost immediately from the restart the visitors' captain Ian Robinson elbowed Blyth's Ben Christienson in the face and was given a straight red card by the referee.

Dunn commented: "Peter was getting a bit exposed so I made the switch at half-time when we were two nil down."

However, even after the use of all three substitutes, his side failed to take anything from a Hucknall side sitting precariously third from bottom of the table.

"I would have been satisfied if we could have got a point which would have helped maintain our gap over the bottom three," he continued.

"But we were awful!

"At training on Monday I tried to drum into the players the need to play things quickly and put the opposition under pressure, but some of them have the mentality of players from lower leagues – and everything doesn't necessarily sink in.

"We also consistently played long balls in to their penalty box which were comfortably headed clear by the big Hucknall central defenders.

"Why did we continue to do it?

"Why didn't we try and get round the back of them?

"It's common sense to me!

Unfortunately common sense is a rare commodity in some footballers."

Rational and honest analysis of their team's performance is an equally rare commodity amongst most managers, but Dunn was not ready to relent in his brutal appraisal of the current state of affairs on the pitch at Croft Park.

"We were laboured, lacked sparkle and, basically weren't good enough," he added.

"Take the front three on Saturday – we needed to stretch their defence, who weren't the most mobile of players, but you could have thrown a blanket over my lads, they played that close to each other!

"Take Hucknall's goals too – for the first the cross should have been dealt with better and for the second, even though goalkeeper Adam Bartlett appeared to be pushed, we still had chances to clear the ball before it eventually ended up in the net.

"What's more, some of the time we couldn't even pass the time of day!

"I expected better from my players."

Disappointed but not downcast Dunn retained a strong sense of purpose: "This week I'll be looking to bring in new blood.

"One or two of the lads are struggling, others have taken their foot off the accelerator after a good run in the new year and seem to be thinking that they just need to sit around and wait till next season.

"I'm looking to change that."

Fate has conspired to hinder that optimism with striker Phil Bell likely to miss the rest of the season through injury and Robbie Dale still struggling to return to fitness.

But with former Workington midfielder Birks being introduced gradually after not playing for several weeks and looking like the sort of player who relishes a battle, the return to full fitness of the exciting Andy Johnson as well as that of Martin Houlahan after illness the there should be no immediate cause for despair in the Blyth ranks.