Axminster Town suffered double disappointment last week with a brace of defeats.

The Tigers lost a midweek meeting with Budleigh Salterton 5-2 and then went down by the odd goal, in five at Totnes and Dartington on Saturday.

In the midweek meeting with Budleigh there was an electric pace to the early exchanges with the Tigers sharing four goals with the hosts inside the opening quarter of an hour. Joel Seward was then unfortunate to see red for a whole hearted challenge and then the Tigers were reduced to nine men with the 35th minute sending off of Sam Heath.

Undaunted the nine still on the pitch stood firm and saw the game through to the break at 2-2.

It was not until well after the hour mark that the hosts managed to finally break the Tigers resistance and they added two further goal late on.

On Saturday Ray Self’s side seemed to be carrying a hang-over from the midweek disappointment into their game at Totnes and Dartington. Despite leading 1-0 at the break thanks to another fine goal from the in-form Jamie Chamberlain, their season long nemesis of defensive error making struck again and they found themselves 3-1 down before a late header from Lee Griffin took them to within a score of the hosts.

Self said: “Over the two games I felt we contributed much and it’s just the old problem of when you are struggling things always seem to go against you! We were unlucky with certain decisions at Budleigh, but equally guilty of some bad decision making in terms of our defending, and the same could be said of Saturday’s game at Totnes and Dartington.”

There’s plenty of life left in the Tigers camp though, and they head into this weekend’s swift return with Totnes and Dartington with Self determined his side will soon begin to get their just rewards. He said: “I do feel we need to be winning this one on Saturday. If we can then we’ll be that much closer to a cluster of clubs. It’s not all doom and gloom and I remain very confident that we are moving in the right direction”.