Bedford Town 3 Stafford Rangers 1

STAFFORD Rangers crashed out of the FA Trophy at the third qualifying round stage as they fell to a 3-1 defeat at the hands of Bedford Town.

Rangers got off to the worst possible start going behind to the Southern League Division One Central side after eight minutes when a Danny Setchell corner was met at the far post by Rory McAuley to head home.

Just three minutes later a poor start was made worse when Callum Donnelly netted for the hosts and Rangers were 2-0 down.

The Boro tried to respond and a long throw-in from Tom Tonks found the head of Theo Bailey-Jones whose effort sailed just wide.

Rangers had goalkeeper Luke Pilling to thank for keeping any hopes alive on 52 minutes denying Lewis Miccio.

However, the defeat looked confirmed on 59 minutes with a third goal after Connor Tomlinson cut in from the right-hand side before firing past the goalkeeper.

Ten minutes later Rangers struck back when a free-kick could only be tipped away by goalkeeper Alex Street into the path of Joe Kenton to slide home into an empty net.

Rangers’ afternoon was complete when Tre Pemberton received a red card for a second bookable offence in the dying moments.