‘It’s just so stupid’ – Horsham FC ‘pretty dire’ in defeat at Salisbury

His comments came after their ‘pretty dire performance’ at Salisbury, where a late, late Whites goal condemned the Hornets to a 2-1 loss – their seventh away defeat in a row.

The home side took the lead through Ollie Morgan just after the half-hour mark and Horsham goalkeeper Lewis Carey was in superb form to stop them increasing the lead.

Harry Hedges scored his first senior goal for the Hornets in the last minute of normal time, but Salisbury still had time to find a winner – through Nathan Odokonyero – in the final minute of added time.

Di Paola said: “Harry came on and did excellently. He scored a good goal and you’re thinking, we’ve been bang average on the day so it’s brilliant to get a point – but we didn’t have any mental strength to see the game out. It’s just so stupid.

“It’s pretty dire at the moment. Roll on half two on Saturday so we can draw a line under it.

“We’ve had far too many underperforming and underachieving at this stage. People just aren’t affecting games, people coming off the bench are incapable of doing it, one or two of our ‘starters’ are bang out of form, but it is what it is.

“We’ve just got to suck it up and deal with it. Hopefully we can perform in our final home game and the boys can turn it on.

“We’ve had a bit of rest this week. It was a long week of travel last week with Weston and Salisbury in the same week. It is a jaded squad with little to play for – and we’ve had little to play for a long time, which I don’t think helps.

“It was a pretty dire performance on Saturday. We had a bit of a resurgence just after half-time where we looked quite good.

“We had a bit of momentum in the second half but we got done on the break – but we did ask the boys to give it a good go and get a goal because we haven’t scored a lot.

“Horror-show defending in the last four minutes cost a team lacking in confidence I think. When you have no confidence you go into panic mode – but we’ve got experienced boys who know how to see games out and we don’t have to panic.

“Lots of factors that we’ve had all season came home to roost – conceding a late goal, not enough goals to hurt teams. They [Salisbury] were there for the taking. I didn’t think they were very good but they were better than us.

“We’ve got one [game] to go and then we can draw a line under it and reflect on it and leave it at that.”

Horsham host already-relegated Chippenham Town in their final National League South game of 2025-26 on Saturday.

And Di Paola added: “We really, really do [want to end on a high]. The support, especially the away support this season, has been absolutely brilliant.

“I know they’re pretty fair and they know how much work we’ve put into this season and can see the boys are running on empty, but I still would have liked to have been able to give them something from that last game – and then targeted three points for the last game to end on 60 points.

“We’re going to give it absolutely everything we’ve got. I don’t think any of us have got a lot left but what we have got we will give I’m sure.”