MANAGER Ian Long says the door is open for Tividale's squad players to stake a first team place following last Saturday's disappointing defeat against AFC Goole.

Tivi lost the game 1-0 after conceding a late penalty and the boss at The Beeches is now looking for his team to respond.

With Tividale due to take on West Midlands Premier side Sporting Khalsa in the JW Hunt Cup last night, Long was keen to see players that have been short of game time now come to the fore.

"The performance away at Goole was not good enough. We didn't play well at all and didn't string two passes together," he said.

"That offers others the chance to stake a claim and show what they can do. The players know that if they do well against Khalsa they have a good chance of being in the line-up this weekend.

"The ability levels in the squad are very even so I have no problems with shaking things up. There are players that have been short of game time because of the great run we have been on, but the door is now open."

The likes of Mitch Botfield, Luke Paskin, Mark Smith and goalkeeper Paul Evans were all set to feature in the cup last night.

Against Goole, it was the home side that started on the front foot and immediately won a corner that Tividale keeper Charlie Price had to push over his bar.

Tividale’s first attempt fell to David Bellis on 16 minutes when Danny Ashton did well to keep the ball alive wide on the left touchline and his cross fell to Bellis but he fired straight into the arms of Goole keeper Peter Fotko.

Tivi switched to what looked like a 4-4-2 formation for the second half and were almost in front on 51 minutes when Nigel Penney ran at the Goole defence and his shot beat Fotko but came off the base of the post and straight back into the thankful keepers arms.

The game seemed to be heading for a draw when on 88 minutes the normally solid and consistent full back Chris Field seemed to get on the wrong side of Tyler Williams as he raced into the box and in an attempted tackle brought the wide man down. Liam Schofield sent Price the wrong way with Goole's first shot on target all game to hand them the points.

Long said: "There was no tempo to the game and the referee was very poor. He booked a lot of players from both sides for dissent and failed to play a number of advantages when given the opportunity. It meant the game couldn't flow, which we really struggled with.

"Too many people had a bad day at the office. They now need to respond."

Tivi will take on strugglers Rainworth Miners' Welfare at home this Saturday. However, the weekend visitors will go into the contest on the back of a confidence-boosting victory over third-placed Sutton Coldfield Town last Saturday.