Watford's 88th minute winner against us in the Carling Cup may have seemed late but the truth of the matter was that it was their first goal at Vicarage Road for more than four months and 459 minutes.

The Watford Observer reported that until the former on-loan Nottingham Forest front man scored two minutes from time to "deservedly send the Hornets through," you had to go back to Tommy Smith's goal 11 minutes from time in the 2-1 win over Coventry City on April 5, for the last occasion a visiting keeper was beaten on his travels to this part of Hertfordshire.

With the prospect of extra-time continuing to loom large Hoskins cleared the ball out of his feet before calmly sliding it wide of Phillips to break Rovers' resistance.

Mickey Adams told the Brighton Argus "it's not all doom and gloom" after Rovers had snatched a late equaliser against his Albion side last Saturday.

Rickie Lambert's late penalty ended hopes of a hat-trick of Albion victories after impressive wins against Crewe and Barnet but Adams said: "It's not all doom and gloom. We have drawn a game, we are three undefeated and we want to go to Southend now and continue that unbeaten run if we can."

Adams felt Albion lost out in a tale of two penalties, awarded by referee Trevor Kettle.

"I thought ours was a definite pen and theirs was flimsy to say the least," Adams argued. "He (Kettle) said it was a shirt tug. Colin Hawkins had his hands on their lad but I don't think he was tugged back in any way and was off the ball anyway. I think the referee has tried to even that up."

The Argus reported that it became clear Rovers were stifling the simple but effective game plan which worked so well for Albion against Crewe and Barnet.

"You cannot fault us for lack of effort or commitment," said Adams. "We probably went a little bit too direct.

"Bristol Rovers had obviously seen us play. We like to get the ball down the sides between the full-backs and centre-halves. Their full backs played right alongside their centre-halves and nullified that".

Adams added: "To be fair to Bristol Rovers, I think they did a job on us. They sat there, didn't allow us any space at all, and we have got to work at that.

"When teams come and sit with a back four and don't move we have got to find ways to break them down and we weren't bright enough to do that".

The Carlisle News and Star reported that John Ward's men could not have had a tougher opening assignment than a return to the scene of last December's 3-0 mauling in the West Country.

The Star's match report stated that the wounds of last season's 3-0 hammering at the Memorial Stadium were also still undoubtedly raw, and there was little to suggest that it was going to be anything less than a tough afternoon in a hard-fought first half.

Despite United's promising start, it was Rovers who took the lead when a Jeff Hughes free-kick was only partially cleared as far as Craig Disley, who sent over a great cross for Rickie Lambert to nod home.

However, United retained their composure and were soon back on level terms.

Rovers failed to react to a short corner and Marc Bridge-Wilkinson sent over an inviting cross for the unmarked Carlton to head the equaliser.

United then drove a dagger into the hearts of the home side in first half injury time when Hackney's left-wing corner was cleared only to the edge of the box, where Bridge-Wilkinson was waiting, with time and space, to blast a left-footed drive into the roof of the net.

The second half lacked the entertainment of the first and it looked a matter of time before Rovers salvaged something - but then up popped Carlton to finish off a classic route one goal in the clinical style of a seasoned striker.

The United defence, which battled manfully all afternoon, made a rare lapse in stoppage time to enable Williams to fire home.

Derby Evening Telegraph reported how a Nathan Ellington hat-trick against Lincoln City in the Carling Cup gave the Rams their first win in any competition since they beat Sheffield Wednesday on penalties in the first round of the FA Cup last January.

Rams manager Paul Jewell admitted later with a grin you would have struggled to remove with a chisel: "We were staring down the barrel."
"What do I feel? Sheer relief," he admitted

Luton Today told how Mick Harford had taken their number of new signings into double figures with the addition of Bristol Rovers' Welsh U-19 international striker Josh Klein-Davies, 19, who had joined on a month's loan,

Lewis Haldane finished on the losing side in his first league game for Oxford United who were thrashed 3-0 at Barrow.

But the Oxford Mail reported that Haldane started to revel in the extra space as the game opened up, and after good prompting play from Murray, the former Bristol Rovers man hit a cracking right-footed drive which produced an equally good diving save to his left, at full stretch from Deasy.