Stevenage's bad day at the office against Bradford City was compounded when an idiot invaded the pitch and went for the visiting players.

The Bantams had just scored the winning goal in a 3-2 success and with the game about to restart, the so-called fan ran onto the pitch and made a beeline for City's Andy Cook.

And had it not been for the quick-thinking of Boro's Michael Bostwick and Alex Gilbey it could have been worse.

Bostwick intervened at the crucial moment with a bodycheck before Gilbey frogmarched the man off the field, not once but twice as the home stewards were woefully slow to respond.

That was something that visiting manager Mark Hughes wanted to praise.

"You don’t like to see that," said the former Manchester United striker. "Credit to the Stevenage lad who recognised what was going to happen.

"If he hadn’t intervened, obviously Cooky wasn’t aware that the lad was trying to give him a clump.

"We thank the Stevenage player for that. If he hadn’t seen that, it could have been a really nasty incident.

"There are idiots everywhere unfortunately. I don’t know what influence he was under but he didn’t do himself or his club any favours."