Pagham battle back for point in Eastbourne - now for visit to leaders

On a very windy day and on a dry but extremely bobbly surface, nobody expected a classic game of football, which was just as well as for the most part it looked like 22 men were chasing a white balloon around the pitch.

It got off to a good start for the Lions, with Lindon Miller driving a low shot on target from 25 yards out in the first minute, only to see Jordan Hawkins, in the Eastbourne United net, dive and save at the foot of a post.

The only other real chance of the first half fell to Eastbourne striker Paul Rogers, who headed over from six yards out. The rest of the half produced lots of effort but no other shots on target.

The second half started at a brighter pace and Conor Geoghegan was forced to clear off Pagham’s goal-line very early on, then a few seconds later Joe Clarke, at the other end, cracked a 25-yard effort just over the bar.

It was the home side who struck first, on 52 minutes, Sam Crabb nodding in unmarked at the far post from an in-swinging free-kick. After Lewis Jenkins had nodded a Jack Barnes free-kick over, United broke away and doubled their tally, Rogers scoring from inside the box with a shot across the goal and into the far corner.

The game looked about up then from Pagham’s point of view, but they kept plugging away and thought they had pulled one back in the 68th minute, Miller scoring a good-looking goal from a sublime Lukas Franzen-Jones pass, only to see it wiped out for offside by the linesman.

After 77 minutes they did halve the deficit as sub Toby Funnell got clear on the left-hand side of the area and blasted his shot home at the near post.

And they weren’t finished yet. With just four minutes left, Jake Heryet got clear on the right and, cutting inside, shot hard towards the goal, only to see keeper Hawkins parry the ball. It went straight back to Heryet though and he joyfully slammed it into the net for the equaliser.

Then, two minutes into added time, Cian Tilley ran through on a long high ball but his attempt to square the ball to a totally unmarked Miller was well knocked away by Hawkins and the chance was gone. A slightly disappointing end but a thoroughly well-earned away point.

Pagham boss Kerry Hardwell was a happy man afterwards. He said: 'The boys deserved their point after all their hard work they put in and we could have had three at the end of the game but a draw was a fair result.

"With a few changes to last week's squad the boys really did battle throughout and it’s great for me as I now have 19/20 players I can call upon at any time to put a shift in for me and the club.

"We’ve now picked up 13 points out of the past six games and find ourselves slowly climbing the table. We head to league leaders Lancing next week which will no doubt be a tough test but we go there full of confidence hoping to get something from the game."

Pagham: Matthews, da Costa (C Tilley), Searle, Clarke, Geoghegan, Jenkins, Heryet, Barnes, Miller, Franzen-Jones (Slaughter), Carroll (Funnell). Sub not used: Henton.