Four days after being trounced 3-0 at the Pan by Crawley Town, braces from Andrew Sandell and Charlie Griffen consigned Kevin Keehan's men to their second heavy defeat of the week.

In fairness to the Rooks, they looked considerably better against Salisbury than they had against the Reds of Broadfields Stadium – although Salisbury certainly lacked the relentless drive and physical presence of Steve Evans' men.

But the hosts still had their chances to get something out of the game and were looking the more likely team to score when trailing 2-1 after the break – until those two late strikes from substitute Griffin left another sour taste in the mouth for the already downcast Lewes fans.

The attendance had more than halved in half a week – from the 1,200-odd present at the Crawley game to barely 550 on Saturday.

That represents a shockingly early lack of faith in the players from the spectators.

After all, if after one encouraging draw away to Kidderminster – and one distinctively unencouraging display at home to Crawley – can lead to such a dramatic dip in gate revenue, times could be even tougher financially at the Pan than first anticipated...that is if results and performances don't turn around soon.

Nevertheless, Lewes did start the game the brighter and Chamal Fenelon, James Fraser – and a seemingly innocuous back pass from Scott Bartlett – all gave Whites' keeper James Bittner something to do in the first quarter of an hour.

In truth, the back pass, which saw the ball squirt through the keeper's legs towards goal before being safely shepherded, gave the crowd more of a lift than the Lewes shots.

At the other end, the Lewes defence – although palpably missing the experience and authority of Danny Cullip – has shown great resolve when defending on the ground in the first three games this season.

It's in the air where the Rooks rearguard has been coming undone – and badly. The aerial vulnerability showed its ugly face once again in two moments within a minute of each other immediately before the opening goal from Salisbury.

On each occasion, relatively unimaginative balls into the box from the flanks were allowed to meet the forehead of centre back Timothy Bond without much in the way of defensive challenge.

Fortunately for the home team, Bond put his free headers first wide and then high.

But there was no such luck three minutes later when, on 19 minutes, a cross from Salisbury's right towards the back post saw defender Chris Breach slip at the worst possible moment, allowing Sandell the simplest of close range headers to open the scoring.

Breach was adamant he had been forced to ground illegally but the goal stood and Lewes had conceded yet another goal from the air.

The one moment of joy for the home fans came five minutes later when Craig Richards played a super ball forward to Fenelon who shrugged off marker Aaron Cook with ease before executing a delightful lob into the net over the advancing keeper.

But the Rooks were unable to stay level for long, and when Salisbury's second goal came, on the half hour, it was by way of another aerial delivery.

Defender Anthony Barness failed to win the ball of Sandell on the left and the City striker forced a save at the near post from Lewes keeper Rikki Banks. From the subsequent corner, the hosts were unable to clear and, from the resulting meleé, Banks could only palm a shot into the path of Sandell, who drove home from five yards out.

Taylor should have levelled just before the break when the ball fell to him inside the six-yard box but the forward elected to take a touch and his shot was blocked.

After the break came Lewes's best spell in the game. Fraser (left), on loan from Bristol Rovers, began to show some League One form, and the second of two exciting jinking runs at the start of the half ended with his drilled shot from 18 yards being finger-tipped onto the crossbar for a corner.

Chances of varying degrees also fell to Michael Standing, Joe Keehan and in particular Fenelon, who twice spurned the opportunity of pulling his team level – first when he spun and shot over from six yards after good work from Fraser and Seb Wallis-Tayler, and secondly when a freak back header from Wayne Turk put him in but the big striker pulled his shot wide.

Lewes's profligacy saw summed up on 87 minutes when a free kick in a good position 30 yards out on the right was carelessly curled straight into the arms of Bittner.

With so many Lewes men still up waiting for the chance to equalise, the ball was played straight down the other end where Griffin side-footed a Robert Matthews square ball home.

Taylor still had time to miss a chance when his header from a mis-hit Fraser shot goes wide from six yards out. And to add insult to injury, Salisbury struck again – and again through Griffin – a full three minutes after the allotted four minutes of added time had passed.