ZAT Knight is looking for a more constructive outlet for his frustration after Wanderers’ play-off hopes took a major blow at The Valley.

Fuelled by a sense of injustice at the performance of referee Trevor Kettle, the big centre-half looked to have talked himself into trouble after the final whistle.

Rumours circulated quickly after the game that the Rutland referee had made it a hat-trick of players sent off by giving Knight a second caution in the tunnel.

But they proved to be unfounded, and the man wearing the captain’s armband was sent out to sum up the general discontent of the dressing room before stepping aboard the team coach.

“I’m not going to blame it all on the ref because we played our part too, obviously, but overall it was a bad day at the office,” he admitted.

“The referee told me in the first half ‘control your players’ because he thought we’d made some bad tackles. Looking back at it, they had done a few late challenges on us.

“Second half it was as if someone spoke to him and said he had to start doing something about it, and it went crazy.

“Right at the end I went to speak to him but he didn’t want to know and pushed me away. Being a player and frustrated because we had lost, I carried on saying what I was saying and once again the arm went up in the air with a yellow card in his hand.

“Yes it’s frustrating knowing that the referee has spoiled the game but it’s gone now and we can’t live on that. Hopefully we can take our anger out on Huddersfield on Tuesday.”

Whether the damage done in defeat is repairable could well depend on Wanderers’ ability to bounce back against the Terriers and continue their impressive run of home form.

Knight has a more optimistic view than most – and that has remained the case all season.

But the big centre-half admits that Wanderers seem intent on doing things the hard way.

“It is harder but then you guys were writing us off a few months ago and I kept saying we still had a chance,” he said. “I proved you wrong then and hopefully I can do again.

“It is going to be tough but we’ve got back-to-back home games now and I’ll do the same as everyone and look back at those games where we dropped points. Had we not done that, maybe we’d be in the top two. But we have made it difficult and we’re where we are for a reason – we made a bad start to the season.”

Considering all the furore over Kettle’s performance with the whistle, Knight felt it was a shame that young striker Sanmi Odelusi’s debut off the bench passed by without a mention.

The 19-year-old was sent on with eight minutes to go in order to try and salvage a point and Knight hopes it will be the first of many appearances for Wanderers. “Young Sanmi came on and I’d like to say congratulations to him,” he said.

“People might not remember his debut because of everything that happened but hopefully that will give him inspiration for the games coming up.”