TIVERTON Town boss Chris Vinnicombe was left angry after a number of dubious refereeing decisions cost his side in their 5-0 defeat at Chesham United on Saturday.

Vinnicombe was furious at the official's decision to award the home side a controversial penalty on the half-hour mark following a tackle by Tom Gardner on United striker Gabriel Fanibuyan.

The spot-kick was converted by Danny Talbot while Tivvy assistant manager Mark Saunders was sent to the stands for venting his frustration.

To further Vinnicombe's irritation, the referee failed to spot an alleged elbow on Liam Ellis, who was forced to have stitches in his eyebrow, with the home side scoring through Fanibuyan in the same passage of play.

Chris Bangura, Dave Fotheringham and Steve Wales each netted in the second half as United made sure of the points with a late flourish.

But for the Yellows player-chief, the game had already been lost following the referee's controversial calls.

"You can't legislate for bad decisions," fumed Vinnicombe. "For the ref to give a dodgy penalty and then to miss the head injury and keep playing and they score off it is difficult to take. They are decisions which should go our way which aren't at the moment.

"For the penalty Tom Gardner made the tackle but he got the ball. The ball seemed to go backwards.

"I said that to the ref but he wouldn't listen. He must have been watching something else. What can you do when the referee won't listen?

"I saw him at half-time and told him 'you're wrong and you made a wrong decision'. But he said 'no, the player got the player first'. He was poor all afternoon."

The reality was that Tiverton flew out of the blocks and should have gone ahead on eight minutes through Joe Bushin, but the striker could only nod wide of the target when left by himself in the box.

Shortly after, Tivvy had another chance to break the deadlock when Russell Jee found some space in the area, before seeing his rasping drive cannon back off the Chesham crossbar.

"We started ever so well," said Vinnicombe. "It makes things seem even more frustrating when you know things could have been different if we'd have taken our chances."

But that was as close as it got for Tiverton, as the hosts gradually got on top. First Talbot slotted home the penalty and then Fanibuyan notched as Vinnicombe's blood pressure rose.

And, despite making a number of changes in the second half, with the former Exeter City left-back himself making way and the Yellows adopting a 3-4-3 formation, there was no way back as United took advantage of Tivvy's capitulation at the back to make the scoreline even more emphatic.

Vinnicombe "I don't know whether it was a lack of confidence but we lost a bit of organisation towards the end.

"The players are possibly feeling the pressure a bit.

"I'm happy to give them a chance though. They are young lads and they are perhaps a bit naive at times, but that will change with time.

"We have to keep going and keep trying to do the right things. Hopefully we'll get a bit of luck on our side soon too. We have to be more ruthless as well, though, because you can't turn up and expect to win games without scoring the chances you get.

"I don't know whether nerves crept in or what but we need to put it out of our minds.

"Just because we have suffered a couple of bad results doesn't make us a bad side.

"We know what we can do well and we have to concentrate on regaining our focus."

Tiverton Town: Draper, Carpenter (Coppard), Martin, Gardner, Vinnicombe (Mortimer), Ellis, Jee, Steele (Sampson), Alex Faux, Bushin, Densham