Hendon lived to fight another day in the FA Cup as they scored 12 minutes from time to force a replay against a Dulwich Hamlet team which had been reduced to ten men three minutes before half-time.

Illness, injury and suspension meant that Hendon were missing nine of their already small first-team squad. The result was a first start for Glenn Garner, the son of former Monty mascot Dave Garner. On the bench was his Under-21s team-mate Michael Roche. Returning to the starting line-up were Berkley Lawrencin, for Richard Wilmot, Rakatahr Hudson, for Marc Leach and Dave Diedhiou for James Burgess, Garner replacing Jamie Busby.

The opening 20 minutes had little to commend it. Although Dulwich did have a couple of reasonable openings, their finishing was lamentable, nothing giving Lawrencin any alarms. He did come off his line well on one occasion, but that was the limit of his exertions. At the other Jamie Lunan watched a drive from Garner go wide.

When Hendon finally found some fluidity they took the lead. After 23 minutes, good passing set up a chance for Garner. His shot was blocked and the ball went out for a corner.

Danny Dyer delivered the corner which was headed half-clear to the edge of the penalty area. Waiting there was Hudson, who displayed commendable technique and ferocious power as he drilled the ball below the crossbar. A defender's attempted clearance was entirely in vain.

Four minutes later, a clumsy challenge by Mohammed Coly resulted in a yellow card. Almost immediately, Hendon put together another good move, but Garner, with time to pick his spot, missed the target.

Danny Dyer, who looked out of sorts on the left wing, cut into the middle after 34 minutes and fired an effort just over the bar. Then both Garner and Diedhiou gave easy saves to Lunan.

After 39 minutes, Coly made another rash challenge, earning himself what was very clearly a final warning. It was one he didn't heed because, just three minutes later, he was late in a challenge on Diedhiou and with very little fuss he was shown another yellow and a red card.

That should have been game over. Leading by a goal against ten men, albeit away from home, was an ideal situation. But it didn't work that way.

Certainly the Greens were desperately unlucky to be deprived of a second goal after 53 minutes. James Bent and Mapes worked an opening down left flank and when the ball was crossed into the middle, the ball bobbled around just outside the six-yard box.

Lunan came out to gather the ball but he was a yard short as Diedhiou drilled it off his body and into the net. The referee's appeared view to be masked by a couple of defenders, but he decided that Lunan had already claimed the ball before Diedhiou struck and disallowed the goal. Lunan's comment was, "I got lucky, I wasn't anywhere near the ball."

For all of Dulwich’s commendable effort and enterprise, they were still unable to put a single effort on target and as the game reached the three-quarter mark it was hard to see them getting back into the game. That all changed with the introduction of Gary Noel for Laurent Hamici after 67 minutes.

Within 45 seconds, the substitute had found himself in space. Lawrencin came off his line, but Noel took the ball around him, made the angle difficult for himself, but still managed to shoot into the far corner for the equaliser.

Hendon's loss of confidence was almost visible and, 90 seconds later, they were behind. Hendon were caught offside 10 yards inside the Dulwich half. Lunan launched the free-kick towards the penalty area where a back-pedalling Mark Kirby was only able to flick the ball back towards his goal.

Lawrencin looked up at the dropping ball and the bright sun - a situation made for disaster. The goalkeeper did get a hand on the ball, but he succeeded only in palming it into the path of Marc Cumberbatch, who simply couldn't miss.

Almost immediately, Lubo Guentchev came on for the tiring Garner, whose first start at this level had showed some level of promise. James Bent then picked up a caution for a very poor challenge on Steve May, but quite how a clumsy challenge on Harry Hunt had not been punished seconds earlier was a surprise.

If the referee had played an advantage in that incident and it hadn't worked, the same could not be said in the 78th minute. A foul on half-way did not result in a whistle and Diedhiou fed the ball to Hunt 30 yards from goal.

Taking the ball ten yards forward, Hunt worked himself a shooting angle and fired a low drive that the unsighted Lunan moved late towards. The ball cannoned off the foot off the right upright bounced along the goalline and rolled into the net about a foot behind the left post.

Before the restart, defender Frank Wilson was introduced in place of Dyer for his Hendon debut.

Although the Hendon defence appeared to panic every time a pink shirt approached to within 30 yards of goal, it was at the other end where the real action came. Hudson headed just over, Diedhiou's attempted volley spun horribly wide - but it would have been a spectacular goal with good connection and a teasing cross from Kevin Maclaren just eluded Guentchev and Diedhiou, when a touch from either would have brought an undeserved winner.

(by David Ballheimer - not to be used without permission by the author)