MARK Beesley was rueful of the “leg-up” his Warrington Town side gave hosts Chester in their Boxing Day defeat.

Yellows were beaten 2-0 at the Leap76 Stadium having conceded early before the hosts made sure of the points in injury-time.

It brings a three-match unbeaten sequence to an end for Town and means a memorable calendar year ends in defeat.

Beesley’s men fell behind after just 12 minutes when, having given the ball away cheaply, they were unable to stop Declan Weeks from driving home the opener.

And while they huffed and puffed to get back into the game, the Seals always looked comfortable and doubled their lead in injury time when substitute Charlie Caton charged down a clearance and tapped into the empty net with keeper Dan Atherton stranded.

“We didn’t do enough to win the game in an attacking sense,” Beesley said.

“We gave a really poor goal away, which gave them a real leg-up in the first 15 minutes. They are very good out of possession as well as in it and to be fair to them, they showed that.

“In saying that, we still had a couple of great chances before they scored right at the end so we’re disappointed to come away from here without any points.

“It’s a place where they don’t concede many goals, so we spoke before the game about not giving them a headstart.

“We’ve got a bad habit of doing that – we’ve come up against the big teams this year and given them a start, whether it’s going down to 10 men or giving silly goals away and it’s hard to come back.

“At places like this, you’re only going to get one or two chances and you’ve got to take them.

“Isaac (Buckley-Ricketts) had one in the first half, as did Josh (Amis) – you’ve got to take those chances.”

Beesley made the decision to change formation for the game, employing a three-man defence with wing-backs as opposed to the team’s usual flat back four.

It meant Peter Clarke was drafted into the side while Bohan Dixon returned to midfield from suspension in place of Dec Walker, who was substituted during Saturday’s win over Banbury United through illness but did take his place on the bench at Chester.

Having gone a goal behind, Town reverted back to their usual formation and while it led to chances being created before the break – Josh Amis flicked an effort narrowly wide while Isaac Buckley-Ricketts forced an excellent save from Seals goalkeeper Wyll Stanway – they could not find a way back.

“We just thought we needed to be that little bit more solid,” Beesley said of the formation change.

“Playing with three at the back is something we’ve spoken about as we’ve got good players there and it gives you more stability.

“Arguably, it probably works if we don’t give such a poor goal away but we’ve done it before this season – it’s not as though we just pulled it from nowhere.

“We’ll always have it in the back of our mind to use at times.

“We felt we needed to get Isaac (Buckley-Ricketts) a bit closer to Josh (Amis) so we tweaked a few things, and we got a bit more of a foothold in the game.

“While we didn’t create much in the second half, we were a bit better in possession and they didn’t really create anything until the last 10 minutes when they got a few counter-attacks.

“We had good control of the ball but without hurting them as much as I’d have liked us to.”

The two sides meet again at Cantilever Park on New Year’s Day and Town will be looking for a fourth straight home victory in the league when they do.

And in that game, Beesley wants to see more of what his side are capable of in an attacking sense.

“We’ve got to look at things we did well and of course, the things we need to do better,” he said.

“We need to tighten up in the first half but we also need to look more at where we can cause them problems.

“Where can we move, where can we make space? It’s those sorts of things we’ve been good at of late.

“We’ve got a couple of training sessions before we play them again, so we’ll go from there.”