WHEN you're down at the bottom of the table, the last thing you want to do is concede a first minute penalty.

But that's exactly what happened to Rovers on Saturday as they slumped to their seventh consecutive league defeat, or relegation form to put it another way.

Captain Steve Frost dived in to a tackle which handed Hinckley the initiative they were never to relinquish.

And although strikers Richard Burgess and Craig Pountney were both in scoring form for the Greens, Bromsgrove seriously need to plug the holes in their leaky defence if they are going to pull away from the relegation mire.

In truth, Rovers didn't play that badly, but they were punished time and again by a Hinckley side on the promotion hunt.

The nightmare began when Frost needlessly felled livewire forward Andy Lucas inside the area and David Sadler converted the penalty with ease.

Lucas doubled Hinckley's lead on ten minutes when he latched on to a through ball from Morton Titterton and rounded Neil Olden in the Bromsgrove goal to score from 18 yards.

Give up the ghost

It would have been easy for Bromsgrove to give up the ghost but to their credit, Pountney pulled one back, ramming Alfie Carter's cross past Brendan Cropley from the edge of the area on 19 minutes.

Just as Bromsgrove prepared for half time with a one-goal deficit to reverse, they conceded another. Titterton was left unmarked at the far post to nod home Neil Cartwright's corner.

The game was as good as over with 20 minutes remaining when Paul Hunter got on the end of a deep left wing cross from fellow substitute Ben Steane.

Five minutes later Richard Burgess showed the potential that has earnt him a one-and-a-half year contract with Northampton Town when he steamed down the right flank and drilled a hard right-foot effort at goal which Cropley could only parry into the roof of the net.

The diminutive Rovers striker was again the pick of the bunch and Rovers will be hoping Northampton release him from his Nationwide league duties as often as possible if they want to remain in the Western Division.

Rovers: Olden, Rowe (sub M Beard 72 mins), Ulfig, S Frost, Crawford, Turpin, Benbow, Burgess, Pountney (sub Bedward 64 mins ), Carter, Biddle.

Attendance: 245.

Rovers man of the match: Richard Burgess.