Notts County boss Stuart Maynard believed Port Vale’s match-winning goal was offside after falling to a 1-0 defeat at Meadow Lane.

The hosts started quickly as Dan Crowley and Alassana Jatta had efforts to put their side ahead, yet both chances were squandered.

Shortly after, Port Vale went into a 23rd-minute lead. Excellent work down the left from Ronan Curtis saw the winger fire the ball low across the County penalty area into the path of Lorent Tolaj, who fired low into the bottom left corner past Alex Bass.

Jayden Stockley came close on a number of occasions in the second half to extend Vale’s advantage.

A goalmouth scramble ensued deep inside the County six-yard box, but the ball just evaded the right boot of the forward.

Then in stoppage time, a long ball from goalkeeper Connor Ripley found Stockley, however, his effort flew over the crossbar.

Substitute Robbie Cundy came close at the end with a header deep into added time, but his goal-bound header was held by Ripley.

County suffered a second straight home defeat, although head coach Maynard was left annoyed about the manner of the match-winning strike.

“It is just frustrating for me as their goal is offside,” he said.

“Would I say it is a definite foul? No, but if you watch it back it is offside, so it is frustrating and it is another game at home that we want to win.

“We have performed to an extremely high level in both games now (Port Vale and Gillingham) and it shows where we are at.

“It shows that we are in a good place to be competing at the top end of the division.

“The subs that we are bringing on at the minute, they are not up to speed and they are getting back up to 100 per cent, so we have to be patient.

“Tuesday night’s game (against Northampton) is going to be important for the squad.”

Port Vale boss Darren Moore was understandably delighted with his side’s display.

“I am really pleased because it was a hard-fought three points,” Moore said.

“We knew it was going to be a difficult place to come and we knew we would have to work hard off the ball, and we got that from the boys today, not just from the starting XI but from the boys that came on.

“It was an all-round team effort. It was the third game in a week and we got this just about right with the system that they play.

“We knew they were really strong, but we had the personnel to deal with that. We tweaked the shape today and it paid off.”