Clevedon Town fell to their second successive defeat, after their loss at Tavistock in midweek, as Shepton Mallet edged a five-goal thriller at The Playing Fields on Saturday.
The Seasiders welcomed back Mitch Osmond, playing with heavy strapping on his broken wrist, who made his 100th first team appearance.
But Shepton opened the scoring after 17 minutes as Joe Morgan beat Luca Smith to a through ball and slot home off the post.
It wasn’t long before the visitors deservedly drew level after 29 minutes.
Elliot Nicholson won a throw from Callum Eastwood’s pass and took it quickly to send Freddie King away past two defenders and into the box before his cross found the back of the net off a combination of three Shepton players.
Clevedon went behind again on 40 minutes, when Morgan was allowed to cut into the box from the right and shoot past Smith just inside the post.
And Shepton made it 3-1 on 70 minutes after Osmond’s cross was headed goalwards by Archie Ferris and Tom Easterbrook pushed the ball out to Fin Wilkinson to clear upfield.
Morgan beat Glen Hayer to the ball and lifted it over the top for Josh Williams to burst clear and flick past the advancing Smith.
Moments later Osmond’s corner found Hayer at the far post, but his towering header was cleared off the line.
And although Clevedon did find the net again, it was too late to make a difference as King cut into the box and shot from a narrow angle through a crowd of players and the ball flew off Elliot Nicholson’s boot from a matter of inches.
Manager Alex White felt defeat at Tavistock clearly had an effect.
“I had no complaints about the result at Tavistock but with the run coming to an end and the goals we conceded seems to have created a bit of uncertainty in our play after looking really solid for a long time,” he said.
“We struggled with anything over the top and looked nervous and edgy, but we still could've won. We were good in possession although we lacked a bit of a cutting edge, and we need to learn from the way Shepton scored three goals from only three shots.
“When they went 3-1 up after Archie’s (Ferris) header was saved it really knocked the stuffing out of us and proved just a bit too much to get back in it.”
Clevedon entertain Brislington at the Everyone Active at 3pm on Saturday in their last home game of the season.
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