The Harriers bad run continued with this narrow defeat at promotion hopefuls Exeter City. City won by the only goal of the game but the Harriers never really looked like scoring themselves until the final minute of the game when they could have grabbed an equaliser twice over.
They failed to take their chances during a first half that they held the upperhand but in the second half, with the wind against them, they struggled to make any headway against a resilient Exeter defence.
We made one change to the side that lost at Stevenage last week with Andy Ferrell coming back into the side from injury and Darryl Knights dropping to the bench. Mark Yates failed to replace Luke Jones with a new signing after the talented defender was re-called to Shrewsbury just before the Stevenage game so Gavin Hurren retained his place in the side.
In freezing cold conditions with deep black snow threatening clouds above it was the Harriers who were to start the stronger. In the first minute a free kick from Jeff Kenna hit Iyseden Christie and bounced out of play and then Dean Bennett had a chance to open the scoring but his shot hit a City player and went out for a corner.
City retaliated with chances of their own when Adam Stansfield raced to reach a loose ball but luckily for the Harriers Chris MacKenzie got there first but the ball still went out for a corner that ended with a shot over the bar from 20yds out.
We came back on the attack straight after with a shot from Matt Barnes-Homer that was blocked on the line but slowly the home side started to take control. This time they went the closest to scoring so far when Stansfield hit the post after hesitation from Mark Creighton and Gavin Hurren let him through.
They almost had another chance gifted them when Alex Jeannin almost put the ball into his own net as he attempted to clear the ball from a deep cross.
We weren't out if it though and we came very close to opening the scoring when Christie played in Russ Penn with a fine cross that Penn headed just wide. Christie could have scored himself just moments later when a cross from Ferrell came over with the City keeper, Marriot, rushing out of his area but the Harriers hitman could only send the ball over both him and the crossbar.
Christie followed that up with another chance that should have been converted when MBH played the ball in to him and again the resultant shot went wide.
With the time on the clock running down we had a breakaway following a City corner. The ball broke for Russ Penn who headed straight for goal but found himself on the end of a crunching tackle from Rob Edwards. The City tough man, remembered by Harriers fans for getting Reuben Reid sent off last season, somehow escaped a red card even though he was the last man. A yellow card was deemed enough punishment.