Sidley suffer agonising FA Cup exit

Whereas the breaks went for them against Lymington Town in the previous round, they rather went against Sidley in this FA Cup preliminary round tie.

Joint manager Andy Laskey lamented: "We had enough chances to win the game and it was very frustrating."

Sidley were much the better side after half time having shaded the first half, but the ball just didn't seem to run their way in front of goal and they were stung by a rare attack from their opponents.

But Laskey was critical of their performance in a defeat which cost them 1,000, their furthest ever progress in the competition and a home tie in first round qualifying.

He said: "I thought our overall performance was probably our worst of the season. I didn't think Worthing were a particularly good side and we threw away probably the best opportunity we've had to progress further than we've been in that competition.

"Whether the occasion got to people I don't know, but we didn't seem to fire on all cylinders from the first minute. We did a few things okay, but overall I felt we let ourselves down."

It was never likely to be a classic in view of the strong wind blowing diagonally across the pitch, two thirds of which was awesome and the other was frankly awful.

Sidley's best moment of the first half came when Peter Baker's shot was saved by the goalkeeper's legs after Shae Spreafico had latched onto a booming clearance by Peter Newstead.

Jimmy Watson also had a loud penalty appeal turned down, while at the other end, Josh Brown effected a crucial last ditch challenge.

Sidley got on top after the interval, though, and had several chances to take the lead kicking down the slope.

Spreafico, whose last game this was before returning to Liverpool, brought a smart save out of Dan Sweitlik before the sprightly forward and Watson were denied in a scramble resulting from Baker's good work.

Sweitlik then pulled off a wonder stop from Watson's downward header and Sidley were hit with the sucker punch when Dan Azimi unleashed a sweetly-timed volley into the roof of Newstead's net in the 73rd minute.