MARK Collier hopes his Chippenham Town troops will learn to heed the dangers of overeagerness after having their fingers burned by Slough Town on Tuesday.

The Bluebirds are back up to third in the Southern League Premier Division but only after being forced to share the spoils with second-placed Slough Town, with Collier’s men seeing a 3-1 lead slip from their grasp.

The two sides also drew 3-3 at Hardenhuish Park last term and whilst harbouring plenty of disappointment at not taking all three points, the Chippenham manager is looking on the bright side.

“We had a disappointed dressing room after the game and that just shows how far we’ve come,” said Collier.

“We’re third in the league and that’s a great position to be in.

“There are some sides that are starting to pull away from the rest and we have to make sure that we do that as well.

“They’re one of the top sides in this division but we’re also one of the top sides in this division and we should take comfort from that.

“We were 3-1 up and maybe we kept trying to attack a little too often rather than sitting back – we spoke to players afterwards about trying to manage the game.

“They attacked with gay abandon and threw everything at us. (Guy) Hollis, their number four, had a long throw and they kept launching the ball into our area.

“Unfortunately, one of those has fallen to one of their players in the 89th minute.”

Andy Sandell opened the scoring when he latched on to a long ball and rounded former Bluebirds loanee Mark Scott but the visitors levelled through Guy Hollis’ deflected effort five minutes before the break.

Chippenham did restore their lead shortly before half-time as James Guthrie’s free-kick found its way into the net and in the 63rd minute, the Rebels were penalised for a handball in the box and Sandell fired home his 23rd goal of the season in all competitions from the penalty spot.

However, Simon Dunn – another ex-Bluebirds man – made it 3-2 with another deflected strike and despite Darren Chitty superbly saving Charlie Moone’s spot-kick 10 minutes from time, the Slough man bundled home a last-gasp equaliser.

Chippenham go to Biggleswade Town next weekend before visiting fifth-placed Merthyr Town next Tuesday evening.

Nuno Felix, Chris Allen and Ryan Campbell could be in contention for Saturday’s trip to Bedfordshire after featuring for Chippenham Park last weekend.