Holders Fylde beaten in FA Vase

Mick Fuller led AFC Fylde to a 2-1 win over Lowestoft at Wembley in May

Holders AFC Fylde's FA Vase journey is over after they were sunk by a late penalty in their fourth round replay against Needham Market on Saturday.

A goalless draw after extra-time in the first tie in Suffolk meant that the sides met up again at School Road, home of Squires Gate.

The pitch at Kellamergh Park was still recovering from renovation work.

After going behind early in the second half, a Steve Palmer piledriver on the hour brought Fylde back on level terms.

But a successfully converted penalty two minutes from time from Needham Market's Danny Thrower sent the Suffolk side through to the fifth round.

There's a debate in our dressing room about whether it was a penalty or not

AFC Fylde boss Mick Fuller

The main talking point of a first half virtually devoid of clear cut chances arrived in the 21st minute.

Needham Market won a corner on the left, and the ball was played back into the path of former Northern Ireland international Kevin Horlock, whose shot from 25 yards took a deflection of Fylde defender Matt Lawlor and ended up in the back of the net.

However, with the visitors celebrating, the referee ran over to his assistant who had raised his flag. After a long debate the referee ordered the corner kick to be retaken, as a second ball had been on the field when the first kick was taken.

Twelve minutes into the second half, the visitors finally broke the deadlock when Danny Smy collected a throw in on the edge of the penalty area, and cut the ball back into the path of Jay Denniss, who fired home from eight yards.

AFC Fylde responded with an equaliser three minutes later, when Palmer chose a perfect moment to score his first goal of the season with a cracking shot from 25 yards into the top corner.

A number of our players have to hold their hands up as they have not performed

AFC Fylde boss Mick Fuller

Fylde began to dominate play and Phil Blackwell, Richie Allen and Joe Booth all had good efforts saved by Needham Market keeper Liam Jones.

With two minutes remaining, Needham Market's Pat Benfield went down just inside the box after a challenge by Fylde's Matt Lawlor, and to the dismay of the home support the referee pointed to the spot.

Thrower atoned for his earlier misses when he made no mistake in converting the spot kick to clinch victory for his side.

AFC Fylde manager Mick Fuller felt that, although his side had not played to their full potential, there were spells when they looked like they could go on and win.

"We didn't play well in the first half, and we had too many players out of sorts. I don't know if our lads had it in the back of their minds it was going to be easy, but we warned them it wouldn't be," he said.

"We were fortunate to get away with the goal that was chalked off. You have to say that two balls on the pitch is a strange reason to disallow a goal.

"In the second half we settled down and I felt once we'd equalised we would go on and win it. We had some chances and their keeper made some excellent saves, but we also had chances that didn't test him as they didn't hit the target.

"There's a debate in our dressing room about whether it was a penalty or not, I couldn't really see from my position whether it was or not.

"But we picked a bad day to have a poor performance, and overall I think they probably deserved it on the day. A number of our players have to hold their hands up as they have not performed," added Fuller.