Brixton AFC 1–2 Hitchin Athletic: a shock to the system

Look, I'll be straight with you. Brixton AFC spent most of Wednesday 19 August looking like a side that had read its own glowing reviews, and Hitchin Athletic, a team in dreadful form, duly turned up and took the points. The final score, 1–2, flattered nobody and hurt Brixton exactly as it should have.

The first half was a quiet, fretful affair. Brixton, top of the table on 45 points before this, passed the ball around as if the goal were a rumour. Hitchin, with 25 points and a 4–0 defeat to these opponents earlier in the season, sat in and let the hosts make their own mistakes. At 0–0, the match had the feel of a trap being gently laid.

Then, on 51 minutes, Hadrian Whitlock stepped up and buried a penalty. That should have loosened everything. A goal shortly after the break, from the league's leading side, against a team in dreadful nick, should have turned the game into a procession. Instead, it woke Hitchin up. Four minutes later, Valentín Múgica-Olano collected Elías Mediavilla's pass and produced an equaliser that makes you wonder what Hitchin were doing being 14th. One moment of clean, angry finishing, and Brixton's composure vanished with it.

The winner, when it came, was almost theatrical. In the 90th minute, with Brixton pushing for something they had no right to, Célio Mascarenhas slipped a pass through a tired defence and Forrest Frobisher, who knows a thing or two about late goals, finished calmly. He scored in the 90th against Wednesbury last month; this one mattered rather more.

So here's the thing. I don't want to overstate one result. Brixton are still top, and Hitchin are still 14th. But the gap between the two sides, on the evidence of 90 minutes in August, felt smaller than the table suggested. Brixton have no room for error: the next matchday arrives tomorrow, and the team that looked so assured going forward for the past fortnight looked, honestly, a bit rattled when it mattered. That is worth noting.