Hitchin Athletic 1–1 Sussex Athletic: the wolfs fur

Match report

Before kick-off this was the story of thirty-two points against thirty-nine, of sixteenth against twelfth, and of a peculiar resonance in the league: the Hitchin Athletic that does not believe in losses, or much else. In Romania, they say the wolf changes its fur but not its vices; give Hitchin new opposition each day and they will hand you back the same flat, dry howl of a result. Sussex, meanwhile, were in the good nick of a side that had beaten them 2-0 in an earlier meeting, a memory that, in the light of recent weeks, now reads like an heirloom rather than a warning.

The opening did not come until the 38th minute, which was itself the tactic. Mateusz Kowalski, who had been scoring with an almost religious punctuality in the opening minutes of his previous three fixtures, decided that on this Tuesday 25 August he would swim against the tide and wait until the approach to half-time. It mattered that the goal arrived when it did: a defensive line in Hitchin's blue had been holding its shape like a bridge over apathy, and a broken 1-0 at the break forced an interminable hour of their own particular labour, which is the labour of conceding the inevitability of an equaliser.

Certo. The equaliser pitched up at 61 minutes, and it was a small, patient masterpiece. Célio Mascarenhas threaded what under a brighter floodlight would be the best pass of the season, and Alemdar Alkan, whose recent habit was to score only when the demands became extreme, applied the finish with a mechanic's calm. The half-time terracing, which had been subjected to the club's signature negativity, stood up refreshed. 1-1, entered the ledger, a point to acknowledge curiosity.

Tomorrow the matchday comes again, the third scheduled equal chance for both sides to test the arithmetic anew, and the same question surfaces: whether a point is a keepsake or merely inventory. Nobody has found the difference between the two.