Horsham manager Di Paola issues squad update ahead of Carlisle United FA Cup tie

The Hornets have been hamstrung by injuries throughout the campaign, and have struggled to maintain any consistency in the first XI.

Di Paola confirmed that four players will miss this Saturday’s game at the Blues, and admitted that his squad will be threadbare.

He said: “We’re down to a squad of 16 at the moment. It’s key that we got minutes into the boys [on Saturday against Carshalton] and made sure we gave everyone a good chance of being as sharp as they can be.

“The squad is a squad of 16 so it’s made it a bit easier for me to pick a team, because in the space of a month we’ve gone from 22, 23 players down to 16 fit.

“We’ve got four out but that’s just the way it is. [We’ll be missing] Tom Day, Doug Tuck, Gary Charman and Alex Malins.”

Di Paola did manage to give much-needed playing time to the likes of Chris Smith, Rob O’Toole and Tom Richards in Saturday’s 3-2 FA Trophy third qualifying round home defeat to Carshalton Athletic.

Danny Bassett and Lewis White put the Robins 2-0 up inside seven minutes before O’Toole reduced the arrears on 31 minutes.

Paris Hamilton-Downes then restored Carshalton’s advantage on the stroke of half-time.

Eddie Dsane got one back with eight minutes to go but Horsham couldn’t force an equaliser.

Di Paola said: “Saturday was important. Chris and Rob have been in and out recently, Tom Richards and Lucas Rodrigues have been in and out too, and they got game time.

“You’ve got four players there who have got minutes in their legs before the weekend.

“I thought we played really well. Chris hadn’t played a lot of football and he started the game, we had a right back [Brandon Chambers] that had never played or trained with us before, Jack Brivio played at centre half, Danny Dudley was suspended.

“There were positives. If you took the first 10 minutes out of the game it was a really even game of football.”