FOOTBALL is such a frustrating game. For all of the good work done, for all the groundwork painstakingly undertaken, it can all unravel in the blink of an eye.

Lose focus and punishment is almost guaranteed. If you don’t have focus, a crack outfit like Guiseley will come up to Blackwell Meadows and happily accept three points placed charitably on their plate.

Only York City and King’s Lynn have secured more points on their travels than Guiseley this season, so there was little chance of a half-baked Darlo side somehow gaining anything but a bloody nose from a side that knows exactly how to get the business done on the road.

That most fans, myself included, looked at Saturday’s game as a good chance to get another three points on the board made the defeat and its manner harder to digest. Having deservedly beaten Guiseley at their place just a week and a half earlier, it didn’t feel like too much of a stretch to think we would be too strong for them again. Apparently it was.

Obviously there is an elephant in the room. The referee, James Westgate, was poor. Very poor in fact. While it is true we were on the thick end of his bad showing, he did miss a pretty blatant penalty for the away side as Liam Connell appeared to get a lot of the man and not a lot of the ball. Then there was the Joe Wheatley challenge which had a distinctly orangey feel about it from where I stood; it could have as easily been red as it was yellow. Yes, the referee played a part in the proceedings but we gave him decisions to make. Such was the level of our performance, we can’t take an awful lot of consolation from being on the wrong end of a bad referee. We only have ourselves to blame.

Referee aside, there was another factor at play; the wind. With the regular south-westerly blowing stronger than usual towards the Tin Shed, maybe Darlo’s abysmal first half showing was down to the wind? Yep, I clutched those straws at half time. While our defence looked static, our midfield looked overrun and our forwards looking so isolated they may as well have come through the turnstiles as paying spectators, maybe it was actually the wind that left us struggling to clear our lines for much of the first half. Turned out the wind had little to do with it as Guiseley doubled down on showing us up in the second half.

This is starting to feel a lot like one of my columns from last season. For those who might be getting a bit nostalgic for listless, unplanned, hoping for something to randomly happen football, Saturday’s performance was right out of the 2018-19 highlights reel. Far too passive throughout with little evidence of a game plan. Of course, that is harsh on Alun Armstrong as we know he has a game plan. There is only so much he can do before sending the players out to enact it. Sadly, his charges let him and us down.

It is kind of pleasing it has taken until the first game in February that I’ve felt so frustrated to write this kind of stuff. We have had a good season so far. We have made significant progress and have got to be delighted with where we currently sit. There is, however, a but.

We have now put two performances in a row where we have been well and truly turned over. Two games where we’ve looked shaky at the back and ineffective in attack. We are allowed to do that. Over a 42-game season there will be little blips. However, with two extremely difficult long away trips next up, there is a danger that our blip could very easily become a slump. As a team, too much good work has been done this season to let it all fall away because of three or four consecutive defeats. We could really do with finding our mojo before hitting the road.