WE ARE one third of the way through the season, joint leaders in the league and hoping to secure our place in the final stages of the cup this weekend.

Yet those supporters who watched both games last weekend, at home and in Guildford, will be asking how a team can play so well at home yet ship eight goals 24 hours later.

We continued our unbeaten home run against Sheffield in front of a large crowd, many of whom have seen us win all nine games this season. I thought we completely dominated our opponents, and could have won by more. It was an effortless performance which should have set us up perfectly for our Sunday game.

There are supporters who have attended all nine away games, and seen our opponents win on six occasions.

We have been in the top three all season, but need to perform consistently, if we want to be competing for silverware.

We knew Guildford would come out hard against us, off the back of their excellent win against Milton Keynes. Despite all we’ve said, we gave up penalties in the first period which allowed Guildford to build up an early lead. By the end of the second period, they were winning 4 -1.

Tomas Karpov, our leading goalscorer, brought us within touching distance with two goals early in the third, but the momentum shifted back to the home side.

They were on their game, more than us. We need to find a middle ground and not fall away to a heavy defeat, which has happened to us twice this season.

There’s no standout team this season. If we want it to be us, we’ve got to play desperate in every game.