BASINGSTOKE Town’s long trip to King’s Lynn proved to be a fruitless one as they lost again to their Norfolk rivals 2-1.

The visitors made three changes to the side which lost at home to Leamington as injured pair George Bennett and Matt Partridge returned to the starting line-up as well as Nana Owusu, who was a sub last weekend.

A great plus for the side was the return from a broken ankle of defender Rob Atkinson, who played the whole of the second half in place of Partridge.

The first 10 minutes saw no real chances at the Walks Stadium, before the Dragon’s Ashleigh Artwell headed just wide.

The teams then swapped chances, with Kegan Everington firing wide for the home side and Sam Deadfield for the visitors.

Then just before the interval, great play between Terence van Cooten and Artwell, saw Aaron Jarvis just unable to touch the ball home.

After the break, Owusu fired over, before Basingstoke shot stopper Alex Tokarczyk was called into action as he produced a great save to deny Ryan Fryatt.

Kings Lynn opened the scoring on 51 minutes, after Chris Ward scored his first ever goal for the Linnets, with a header.

The Dragons roared back and just after the hour mark, Jarvis headed in a Deadfield corner to make it 1-1.

However, as in the first game at the Ark Cancer Charity Stadium, Kings Lynn they were to run out 2-1 winners, as Tom Ward scored the winner in the 68th minute.

After this the visitors went searching for an equaliser, captain David Ray went close with a header from a Deadfield corner.

As in the first game between these sides the Dragons deserved more, but left empty handed.

Basingstoke will hope to snap their two game losing streak, when they travel to St Ives on Saturday, both sides currently have 50 points, but the Cambridgeshire side have a game in hand.