Referee 'not the reason' Dons lost to Lincoln

A terrible penalty decision may have cost his side the first goal of the game against Lincoln City, but Russell Martin refused to blame referee Brett Huxtable for Dons' 2-1 defeat.

Baily Cargill's challenge on Tom Hopper looked clean as a whistle, but Mr Huxtable, who was around 30 yards behind the play, awarded a spot kick after just 10 minutes, allowing Jorge Grant to roll home the opener.

While Joe Mason equalised on the hour mark - with an air of offside about his goal - Hopper would have the final say, heading in Lincoln's winner with 12 minutes to go.

Martin though refused to use Huxtable as the reason for Dons' defeat, even though he disagreed with the penalty decision.

"It's not the reason we lost, but it is the wrong decision, I told him that," said Martin afterwards. "I know it's a hard job, and on the whole we don't give the referee or fourth official a hard time. But he's said he thinks Baily has come in from behind, but he hasn't, it was shoulder to shoulder.

"We're disappointed to have put ourselves in that position to let him make a decision. We have to react better to that though. It has played a huge part in the game, but I won't blame him for us losing the game."

Instead, Martin pointed at a litany of issues his side had for their lethargic opening 45 minutes.

He continued: "I was not happy with the first half at all – that's nowhere near out usual standard. Once we conceded, we showed too much anxiety and too much confidence in what we were doing, we made too many mistakes and were too disappointed when we lost the ball.

"I felt completely different in the second half. We looked really good for the first half an hour, we controlled the game, we looked dominant after we equalised. I think Lincoln looked really tired after we equalised and from there I thought we'd get at least a point, and there would only be one winner.

"But we've given away a really soft goal which is just not good enough and it has ultimately cost us a point."