BASINGSTOKE Town suffered their first home league defeat in six games as they lost to visiting St Ives Town.

The Cambridgeshire visitors won the game with two goals in the first 45 minutes and then defended to a man to keep the Dragons out.

St Ives had a dream start as they took the lead after three minutes, as Jack Higgs’ low corner found its way right across the box and was tapped in at the far post by Dubi Ogbonna.

After this the home side’s Rob Atkinson fired wide and then the visitor’s Josh Dawkin forced a save from Alex Tokarczyk.

From a home corner they so nearly equalised as Sam Deadfield’s free-kick was flicked on by David Ray, but came too fast for Romone Rose to control his header and the ball flew over the bar.

St Ives carved out another chance soon after, as Tom McGowan managed to get into the box, but a great challenge from Joe Gater denied him.

After 29 minutes, the Dragons were forced to make a change as striker Rose limped off and was replaced by Aaron Redford.

The sub so nearly made an immediate impact, when found by Nana Owusu, but he fired over.

A minute later and St Ives doubled their lead as McGowen’s cross to the far post was tapped in by Danny Kelly.

For the start of the second half, Basingstoke manager Terry Brown made his second change as leading scorer George Hallahan came on for Michael Atkinson.

It so nearly reaped a reward after just five minutes, as Hallahan beat the out rushing St Ives goalkeeper to the ball, but fired just wide of the empty net.

St Ives then so neatly made it 3-0, but Gater with a superb goal line clearance denied Kelly.

Then after the hour mark, a nice one two between Kelly and McGowan, saw the latter shoot just wide.

At the other end of the park, the Dragons huffed and puffed, but just could not find that killer ball to break open the visitors defence.

They tried everything and never gave-up, but sometimes it is just not your day and this proved to be the case.

Talking after the game Terry Brown said: “I was pleased with the way we kept going today. St Ives are a good side, but we gave them an early goal, which gave them a platform to defend.

“I felt our two best players today were Sam Deadfield and Matt Partridge for the amount of distribution they gave to the front three.”

Next for the Dragons is a third round home tie in the Hampshire Senior Cup on Tuesday night (7.45pm) against Wessex League side Cowes Sports.

Looking at his team selection for this game Brown said: “All five subs will start on Tuesday and I also hope to have Aaron Jarvis back from injury. The rest of the team with be made up of today’s starting XI, so we will have a strong side.”