BARROW AFC’s seeming inability to see off struggling sides reared its head again.

Bring on the big guns like Lincoln, Tranmere Rovers and Dagenham And Redbridge and the Bluebirds can see them off without too much trouble. Bring on those teams fighting for their lives and it is a different story.

That was the case on Saturday. Visitors Woking are fighting to get out of the relegation places yet it took losing a man and conceding a goal to sting the Bluebirds into action.

Barrow called the tune in the first half but never looked really threatening. A string of throw-ins down the left eventually led to a cross but Richie Bennett lifted his shot over the bar. The same player had another effort turned away for a corner.

Paul Turnbull had a shot blocked in a crowded goalmouth and the same player sent a free-kick inches wide.

It wasn’t until the 25th minute that the Cards threatened. Delano Sam-Yorke outpaced Shaun Beeley down the left, cut inside and his shot from a narrow angle was turned round the post by Jon Flatt.

Then it was back to action at the other end and good defensive work by Joey Jones denied Danny Livesey a chance at a free-kick. Then a rising shot from Liam Hughes, from just outside the box, went just over the bar.

But things changed in the final minute of the first half.

Somehow Woking managed to put Barrow under pressure. The home goalmouth was crowded and Jamie Lucas got in a shot that saw Turnbull and keeper Flatt both diving to their left. Unfortunately for Barrow it was Turnbull’s hand that turned the ball wide.

The referee gave Turnbull a red card and Lucas scored from the penalty spot. So in only their second attack, the Cards had the lead and Barrow were a man down.

Manager Paul Cox’s interval reaction was to put more threat in his midfield with Jack Thomas and Matt Platt called into action.

It paid dividends in the 51st minute. Jordan Williams was fouled just outside the box, although Woking’s Brian Saah seemed far from happy with the decision. Williams lined up the free-kick and he sent the ball into Michael Poke’s right hand corner of the net.

There was a bit of a gung-ho attitude in the Barrow play as they strove to take the lead and they paid the penalty in the 70th minute when Keiran Murtagh had one effort pushed away before he buried his second attempt to put the Cards ahead again.

It took 13 minutes for Barrow to get level again with Bennett bundling the ball over the line. And he picked up a yellow card as he tried to get the ball out of the net and get things moving while Sam-Yorke, also booked, did his best to deny Barrow the ball and add to all the time wasting that the Cards had got away with.

Then in injury time Woking got the ball in the Barrow net again but it was ruled as offside.

When Cards boss Garry Hill queried the verdict after the final whistle the linesman told him that the ball had bounced off the stomach of one of his players and then another, in an off-side position, had turned it home.

The version of an unhappy Hill was that the ball bounced off Sam-Yorke’s stomach and he followed it up to net so he couldn’t have been offside.

The point eased Working out of the dreaded bottom four on goal difference while Barrow are three points away from a play-off place . . . . . . but the games are running out.