Tommy Taylor's return to former club Leyton Orient ended in stalemate despite Darlington being under pressure for most of the game - but at least Quakers didn't play as badly as they did against Torquay.
On Saturday Darlington were dreadful and last night the division's second-bottom side out-played Quakers for much of the game but Orient failed to take their chances while Quakers rarely looked like creating a goalscoring opportunity. But the point would surely have pleased Quakers chief Taylor, who was boss at Brisbane Road for five years until he walked-out in October and joined Darlington two weeks later.
Gary Pearson failed to recover from a hamstring strain and was replaced by David McGurk while Neil Wainwright and Paul Campbell came in for Danny Mellanby and Neil Maddison as Tyalor reverted to his favoured 4-4-2 after starting with 4-3-3 in Saturday's debacle.
Had it not been for George Reynolds' intervention last week, Iyseden Christie would've played for Quakers at the weekend, but the chairman blocked the proposed loan move and, somewhat ironically, Orient gave the pacy striker his first start of the season.
And he showed Darlington what they're missing after ten minutes when he raced past David Brightwell but fired his shot wide.
He came much closer to opening the scoring ten minutes later as his angled left-footed drive was fumbled around the post by Keith Finch after Wainwright ran the almost the length of the field only to see his cross caught by the keeper. Minutes later Christie again received the ball in the final third but saw his excellent delivery cleared.
As the strong wind played havoc with the quality of the game, Darlington saw little of their opponents' goal in the first half as Quakers were restricted to three long-range efforts, but Wainwright's triple effort never looked live troubling Scot Barrett.
The home fans were in uproar just before half-time when Paul Campbell's challenge on Matthew Brazier put an end to the Orient winger's evening. And the Brisbane Road faithful displayed their disgust at the tackle by yelling 'Taylor out' which was their favourite terrace chant during his five-year reign in east London.
In injury time of a first-half played-out almost exclusively in Darlington's half, Wayne Gray burst into the penalty box but he blasted his shot over Finch's bar.
Shortly after the break Finch pulled-off a marvellous save as Christie found himself one-on-one having beaten the offside trap, and seconds later McGurk stopped a certain goal as Neil Gough was about to prod a slide-rule pass into the empty net but the defender, playing as an unorthodox left-back, slid in to block.
With 20 minutes remaining Taylor sent on Neil Maddison up front in place of the bemused Mark Sheeran, who himself had replaced the injured Barry Conlon after 20 minutes. But the former Middlesbrough star almost scored with his first touch only for keeper Barrett to save dramatically.
*This week's fans forum with chairman George Reynolds, PR Director Luke Raine, club directors, manager Tommy Taylor and his assistant Mick Tait will be held in the Feethams Ambassador Suite starting at 7.30pm tomorrow.
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