“I’M SURE everyone would agree that it’s a well-earned point.”

That was how Steve Watson reflected upon York City’s hard-fought 0-0 draw with Kettering Town on the muddy pitch of Latimer Park.

On balance, the draw was the fairest result after 90 minutes with the boggy surface preventing either side from dominating possession.

And though Kettering edged the quality and quantity of the chances, York’s defence remained strong to deny the hosts the victory.

Watson had said in his pre-match press conference that the game may not be the greatest spectacle and it was a prediction that bore true.

King’s Lynn’s victory over Blyth sees them open up a three-point gap over the Minstermen, but Watson had few complaints with the outcome.

“It was really hard work and a really hard battle,” said Watson. “But all of my players have stood up.

“It was almost impossible to get the ball down and play, although we did two or three times early in the first half before the pitch cut up too badly.

“I just thought that we stood up to what they tried to do.

“Our keeper was called upon three or four times and he made three or four outstanding saves, as did their keeper.

“They’re effective at what they do. If I was managing a team coming here in the next two months, I wouldn’t relish playing here.

“I think that they might just cause a few upsets here.

“I think that if you look at all of their chances, they’ve all come from second balls from crosses. It fell to them better than it fell to us.

“But, ultimately, we kept the clean sheet.

“We weren’t set up to play like that, a lot of our chances came from trying to get behind them. Kempster galloping into the box and trying to get crosses in and that type of thing.

“I think that the quality of crossing was almost impossible, for both sides, unless it was a dead ball because as soon as you plant your foot, it sinks and the crosses hit the first man quite a lot.

“It could have gone either way. It was a tough battle and that’s all you can really say about the game.

“It wasn’t a great spectacle. But it was two teams who probably earned a point.”

Alex Kempster was a tireless runner for York from the first minute until the last and he drew the attention of both Watson and the Kettering coaching staff.

“I thought Kempster worked his socks off again and he's always a threat,” Watson said of the striker’s performance.

“I thought that he was outstanding.

“One of the Kettering staff mentioned how impressed he was with Alex and it’s nice for them to compliment one of our players.

“I thought that he was a threat all day. I thought that with the amount of runs he made, that he would tire, but he was still going, even in injury time in the mud, which shows that he’s very fit.

“There’s still loads more to come from him.”

A power cut around the ground meant that the lights in the dressing rooms weren’t on until 20 minutes before kick-off, with the players having to change in the dark.

Watson added: “If we’d have lost, I wouldn’t have used the preparation as an excuse. It was the same for both sides. That was just the way things were.

“We didn’t know what their pitch was going to be like and I’m not going to be disrespectful to be slagging other people’s pitches off.

“It’s hard work and it was a hard-earned point in the end. If we had nicked the win, it would have been an outstanding three points, probably our best away win of the season had we done it.

“The lads have come here, got off the bus, got changed in the dark, jumped onto the training pitch to train and played a very tough game.”