Clarke grabs late winner for Blues

The striker came off the bench to glance in Jordan Wood's near post cross five minutes from time to clinch a 1-0 success at Eastbourne United Association.

"It was a very good result," said manager Liam Barham, who added that he has filed seven-day approaches for two players. "It was a really bobbly pitch and a really windy night and it was a scrappy game. Both defences were pretty solid and well-organised and I thought it was heading for a 0-0 draw. Of course we would have taken nil-nil with the players we had out, but they are the games we need to be winning if we're going to be in the top half of the table this year.

"First half I wasn't totally impressed with the way we played, but second half we upped the tempo a bit. Possibly we shaded it second half because we were probably the more organised side and we started to get the second ball in the middle of midfield. Overall a nil-nil possibly would have been a fair result, but I was made up with the win."

And the win took their September points tally to a healthy-looking 13 out of a possible 18 with just their second clean sheet of the campaign.

That second shut-out was rarely threatened other than when rookie goalkeeper John Saunders, playing because Greg Thurstans was unavailable and Peter Newstead was injured, made a smart stop in the first half to deny ex-Blue Scott McDonald.

Sidley, who put Kevin Rose back to centre-half and pushed Chris Steward into midfield to cover for the suspended Barham, didn't threaten much either, although Chas Lister blazed over with only goalkeeper Mark Oldroyd to beat after four minutes.