Valentine's outing:

Marlow travelled to Tulse Hill & Dulwich looking to reverse the home defeat inflicted by the South Londoners, but returned home in a mood less than ideally suited to any romantic Valentine's dates that they may have had planned.

The visitors were confident that some recent productive training sessions and strong performances, albeit without getting results, would stand them in good stead for a game that they expected to get some return from.

However, recent trends continued with Marlow conceding the first goal on 10 minutes, but an immediate response was forthcoming with Captain Land firing home from an acute angle after some incisive play down the left to level the game inside a minute.

Sustained periods of possession and territorial advantage yielded no positive results so it was to great frustration that in the space of 4 minutes a swift counter leaving Dercksen exposed and a misplaced pass from Ashton, clearly forgetting that Marlow were in white for the day, handing possession to THD who gratefully accepted and converted the turn over, left Marlow trailing 3 -1 at the break.

The restart saw Marlow close the gap after 7 minutes with a trademark reverse stick finish from Turner, just rewards for some tenacious play in the opposition D from Ali Dalton resulting in the ball falling to Turner who manufactured enough space to fire home.

The combinations of Gerritts, Luff and Goodman in the middle of the park continued to exert leverage and the rotating forward line ably led by Land continued to make some headway but with only occasional chances being created the frustration was exacerbated by a scrappy counter again resulting in a 2 goal deficit.

Marlow continued to battle and Goodman was rewarded for his daylong efforts with a neat finish but with only a minute to go it was too little too late. Another frustrating day sees the Reds drop a spot in the table.

A couple of areas of focus in the coming week will see Marlow back at Pound Lane confident of an important performance and result against a visiting West Hampstead team who sit a couple of places above the Reds in the lower mid table tussle.