SOUTHAMPTON-based goalkeeper Simon Arthur is out for the rest of the season in another nightmare turn of events for Fleet Town.

The England schoolboy international broke his ankle in Saturday's disaster-ridden 3-0 defeat at Sittingbourne which leaves the north Hampshire club four points adrift at the foot of the Dr Martens Eastern Division.

Arthur fell awkwardly following a clattering challenge as he went up to collect the ball and was due to be operated on at Southampton General Hospital yesterday.

With only a dozen players available for the journey to Kent, co-manager Adi Aymes, the former Hampshire wicket-keeper, was named among the substitutes and found himself flung into emergency action as a goalkeeper shortly before half-time.

But that was far from the end of Fleet's ill-fated afternoon.

To add insult to Arthur's injury, they had former Saints Academy striker Shea Saunders sent off for retaliation after 68 minutes and James Bull, signed from Exeter City, also saw red late on for dissent.

For all the disruption, Fleet - trailing to a third-minute Lee Guiver goal - somehow held strong until Kieran Marsh bagged the Brickies' second five minutes from time.

Bull's dismissal followed and Fleet's nine men were punished again by a late Clint Gooding header.

"We've had some unbelievably bad luck and I just keep asking myself when it's going to stop," sighed Fleet's co-manager Mark Dennis.

"But I've told the boys to keep their heads up. The good thing is that no one's getting too far away from us in the table and two wins will get us out of it.

"After the season we've had, we've got no right to still be in with a chance of escaping relegation, but fortunately results went our way again on Saturday."

Fleet are trying to persuade former Saints, Basingstoke and Andover keeper Dean Beale to don his gloves again in place of Arthur.

There was more red-card mania at Newport where the Islanders needed an 88th-minute Gareth Keeping equaliser to nick a point from nine-man Corby Town in a 2-2 draw.

Corby, without a win in their previous 14 games, took a surprise fifth-minute lead through Danny Marlow when Newport fell asleep at a setpiece.

Former Lymington & New Milton midfielder Keeping brought the Islanders back on terms when he bundled home Adam Lang's stoppage-time corner and Port should have cashed in again after Corby's Wayne Spencer was sent off following a run-in with Pete Tagg in the 59th minute.

But against the odds, the Northamptonshire visitors regained the lead through Robbie Maddox eight minutes later, again from a set-piece, before Keeping's late strike got the Islanders out of jail.

Corby were reduced to nine men in the 89th-minute when substitute Lane Clark got his marching orders.

The result leaves Steve Tate's men 16th in the table, two points better off than fourth-to-bottom Corby with three games in hand.