OUR good run of form has finally come to an end. It was never going to last forever, but the manner in which it came crashing down at Brackley on Saturday was disappointing.

Trailing 5-0 at the break was the ultimate wake up call for a side that has barely put a foot wrong in recent weeks. While we won the second half 1-0 (whoop whoop!), the first half performance meant Darlo were left challenging Prince Andrew for the prize of having the worst 45 minutes of Saturday.

Despite all the positivity flying around the club at the moment, I’ll level with you and say I was feeling a bit sceptical ahead of the game. Despite not having had a game during the midweek, I’d been a tadge concerned about what effect our efforts from the week before at Walsall would have on the side. We emptied the tanks at the Bescott both physically and mentally. Would there be anything left?

Then, there was the prospect of the replay this Wednesday in front of the television cameras. Arguably a bigger game for many of our players than the original tie with the spotlight being firmly on them. Would the players take it easy?

I’m sure they would not like that charge being levied against them, but to be brutally honest I wouldn’t have found too much fault with them if they had. After all, they are only human. It’s a massive game and they all want to be involved. Finally, there was the opposition.

Brackley are an excellent side. Well-resourced and consistently good over our National League North years, there were many easier fixtures to be had in between our cup exploits. As it was, I fancy a combination of these factors resulted in our dreadful first half. Mercifully, Brackley eased off the throttle a fair bit in the second half.

The manner of our capitulation will concern Alun Armstrong. We have looked really solid as a defensive unit over the last few weeks but on Saturday our defensive shape resembled a poorly set jelly; it was all over the place.

The only key difference between our bumbling and that of Prince Andrew was at least we broke sweat.

One thing that really stood out for me was the lack of a focal point up front. While we managed well without Tyrone O’Neil at Walsall, that was a one-off cup tie where anything went. The game at Brackley was the first proper game where we got to see what life without a line-leading striker would look like and it was a bit tricky. Not having that guy who can hold the ball and bring others into the game made life hard.

I suspect it played a role in the side losing its shape as we had to tried and get more support around a pretty isolated Adam Campbell. It’s not ideal but we’ll just have to keep working on it.

If there’s no one out there who is available or who we can afford to bring in, que sera sera. A small squad and player availability issues means we just have to knuckle down and make the best of the situation in hand.

Hopefully, we can put the poor performance behind us quickly as we will need to be right on our game on Wednesday. This is a massive occasion for the club as we finally get the sort of exposure we have craved for years. This is our chance to give the watching public an insight of what a fan-owned Darlington Football Club is all about.

There is going to be a significant onus on the starting XI to get the job done given our limited options from the bench. It means us fans will need to get right behind the lads and ideally make Blackwell Meadows as hostile as possible. With a great atmosphere under the lights and with a sprinkling of FA Cup magic, anything is possible.