Barnet 2

Cardiff 2

Barnet may have come back from a dreadful start and a two goal deficit to earn a point, but this was a definite hiccup in their promotion push.

The Bees are now unbeaten in nine games, but they can't afford to drop too many home points against opposition like Cardiff if they're to win automatic promotion.

Only bottom two Doncaster and Brighton have scored less goals than the Bluebirds this season, yet twice in the first 16 minutes they reduced Barnet's ultra-reliable defence to shreds.

It was so nearly Barnet who got off to a flyer, the eager Scott McGleish hooking home a neat volley in the second minute, only to be denied by the linesman's flag.

And the East Terrace faithful were in the process of informing their visitors they would score in a minute when Cardiff did just that.

The lanky Jason Fowler picked the ball up 40 yards out and picked his way through a series of half-hearted challenges with ease before pulling the ball back for Andy Saville to score with a scuffed shot from six yards.

Worse followed in the 16th minute after another comedy of errors in the Barnet defence.

A misunderstanding between Lee Harrison and Lee Howarth conceded a needless corner, Fowler picked up a short ball from Wayne O'Sullivan and was allowed ample time and space to drill in a left foot shot from the angle of the box.

"We started looking very lackadaisical, we conceded goals because of faults in our organisation, we didn't do our jobs at the back," said manager John Still.

"We never concede goals from set pieces, but we did today."

With his team showing few signs of life, Still took drastic action mid-way through the half, replacing Mike Harle with the streetwise Ken Charlery.

But Barnet were still daydreaming at the back, Harrison making a brave block from Saville after a mistake from Goodhind, then getting his fingertips to Carl Dale's angled screamer with a majestic leap.

With time running out in the first half, Barnet got back into the game when the lethargic Sean Devine temporarily sprang into life, racing onto McGleish's flick on only to be felled by keeper Jon Hallworth.

Paul Wilson dispatched the resulting penalty with ease, and Barnet were back in it.

"It was a great time to get a penalty," said Still, whose side started the second half in far more purposeful fashion.

With Devine in one of his more petulant moods, it was left to the ever willing McGleish to complete the fightback with a performance full of fire and clever touches.

The little striker levelled the game with the cutest of back headers in the 68th minute, diverting the ball past Hallworth after the excellent Greg Heald had bundled a Wilson corner into the danger area.

Heald thumped a header wide from another corner, McGleish shaved the post with an acrobatic volley and Devine took a touch too many after good work by John Doolan, but Barnet didn't really deserve any more than a point.

"In the second half I thought Scott McGleish's work-rate was absolutely fantastic, and he took his goal very well," said Still.

"But overall we were poor, it was a bad day at the office for us, but we've come out of it with a point.

BARNET: Harrison, Goodhind, Harle (Charlery 26), Heald, Howarth, Stockley; Doolan, Wilson (Basham 83), Simpson (Searle 60); Devine, McGleish

CROWD: 2,406

MAN-OF-THE-MATCH: McGleish

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