NIALL MCGUINNESS felt that poor officiating played its part in Flint Town United's Welsh Cup defeat to Bala Town.

Flint were beaten 3-0 by the Lakesiders in the third round clash at Cae-y-Castell, which also saw skipper Richie Foulkes dismissed for violent conduct and defender Andy Brown hobble off with a broken ankle.

A first half Steven Tames goal put Bala ahead, before the visitors capitalised on their numerical advantage with further strikes from Chris Venables and Mike Hayes.

And Silkmen boss Niall McGuinness was left aggrieved by the decisions that went his side in the clash.

He said: "Overall I was impressed with our performance.

"For the first 25 minutes I thought we stuck to our game plan well and were the better side.

"Normally I'm not one to criticise referees and officials but their first goal looked clearly offside and that was harsh on us.

"It was a real turning point in the game, because we're chasing it from that point.

"But then to have Foulkesy shown a straight red for an altercation with a Bala player, who only got a yellow card himself was really tough to take.

"I didn't see the incident clearly, but if he's supposed to have thrown a punch then I'd like to know what was said in the build-up to it.

"There's also the fact that we've been awarded a free kick after (Bala midfielder) Henry Jones has dived, but the player hasn't been booked as the rules say he should have been.

"He did get a yellow for a rough challenge later in the game, but he should have been off at that point.

"You want balance from referees in that situation, but we felt that Bala got all the protection and we were on the end of some very poor decisions."

Victory for Colin Caton's Bala set up a fourth round clash at Haverfordwest County.