Dead balls are killing us, says Racing Club boss

The defeat followed a 4-2 reverse at Bloxwich in the Midland Combination Premier on Saturday and left manager Curly O’Callaghan bemoaning his side’s flimsy backline.

“I can’t criticise the effort, commitment and workrate, but we just can’t defend from set-pieces and corners,” said O’Callaghan.

“As soon as a cross comes into the box it looks like we’re going to concede.

“On Tuesday night we were 3-1 up and cruising against a good side.

“But they’ve gone on to score three goals from set-pieces and we can’t keep conceding cheap free-kicks around the box.

“In fact, if we didn’t have free-kicks and corners, I’m sure we’d be in the top six.”

Despite conceding in the 70th second at Bloxwich, Racers recovered to lead 2-1 courtesy of strikes from Paul Wilkinson and Ben Purser.

However, Bloxwich were 3-2 up at half-time and went on to add a fourth after the break.

Racers also held a lead in midweek, with Tom O’Callaghan’s goal adding to efforts from Luke Wilson and Luke Swinnerton to put the home side 3-1 up.

But once again Racing Club’s defensive frailties came back to haunt them as Dudley Town went on to book a place in the next round.

Racing Club are in cup action again tomorrow, with Coventry Spires the visitors for a Coventry Evening Telegraph Cup clash (1.45pm).

Spires play in Division Two of the Midland Combination and O’Callaghan admits work needs to be done to avoid another quickfire cup exit.

“It’s a potential banana skin, but if we perform anything like we have done in previous games I expect us to win,” he said.

“We haven’t played badly, it’s just corners and free-kicks that have been an issue for us.

“It’s something we’ll work on and have a chat about in training and hopefully it will turn for us.”

Racing Club follow tomorrow’s cup clash with a league trip to Pershore on Tuesday night.