Eastleigh 1-0 Woking – Woking lose on the road for the first time since September

Woking’s near five-month unbeaten away league record came to an end at the Silverlake Stadium as Eastleigh’s Vincent Harper scored the only goal of the game. His second-half strike was enough for The Spitfires in Hampshire.

Ten minutes into the game, Woking had their first break when Rhys Browne went down on the edge of the box from a poor challenge, but no foul was given.

The Cards continued well by soaking up the pressure and the defence restricted Eastleigh to wide areas, not allowing any shots. Luke Wilkinson made his return to the starting XI for the first time since October.

Ex-academy graduate Charlie Carter had the host’s first major chance when he looked to find Danny Whitehall with a cross from the left, but the ball got lost around a mass of players before Craig Ross was able to claim.

HT: 0-0

In the second half, Woking managed to build up the play patiently and when Josh Casey found space, his cross was met by Browne, but his effort went just wide of the net.

Eastleigh had a major chance to go in front just after, but Dan Moss got his body in the way of Kairo Mitchell's strike, ten yards from goal.

It didn’t matter for much longer though as The Spitfires took the lead when they countered quickly and Mitchell played in Harper down the left-hand side, who ran 25 yards before slotting the ball past Ross. This left the 622 travelling supporters in dismay.

They nearly doubled their lead when a long ball found Mitchell one-on-one with Ross who had left his line, but the forward's attempt to loop the ball over the ‘keeper from the edge of the box landed on the wrong side of the post.

Woking had many chances to get level, one of which saw Kyran Lofthouse beat his man on the right-hand side and cross with power to find Marcus Dackers, but his header cannoned back off the post.

Deep into injury time, Padraig Amond had a glorious chance but his snapshot inside the box went miles over the bar, to see his side fall to defeat on the road for the first time in nine games.

FT: 1-0

These things happen, it’s important to remember that we are defying expectations this season and small blips are perfectly normal. However, we now start the chain of our most important games for the remainder of the season. Chesterfield away is up next, followed by Boreham Wood at home, the Wrexham away. Bromley at home after that is also massive. Now it’s about showing how far ‘little old Woking’ have come and really cementing our name onto the map.

People have doubted us, they’ll see this as the start of the decline, but no one believes more than I do that something special is brewing and who knows, this could be just what was needed heading into Tuesday night’s game… #COYCards

Eastleigh Starting XI: McDonnell, Maghoma, Carter, Cisse, Whitehall (78), McKiernan, Harper, Mitchell, Panter, Rutherford, Lloyd

Subs: Flitney, Martin, Hesketh (78), Langston, Payne

Woking Starting XI: Ross, Moss, Wilkinson, McNerney, Casey, Kellermann, Ince, Anderson (68), Hessenthaler (62), Browne (68), Amond

Subs: Dackers (68), O’Connell, Lofthouse (62), Cuthbert, Daly (68)

Attendance: 2,528

Man of the Match: Rohan Ince