Nightmare ends Lingfield's run

RUR Charity Cup,

Third Round

Lingfield 1

Seaford Town 2 (Played at Seaford)

IT was a nightmare day for Lingfield as they dropped out of the Charity Cup on the South Coast.

With the Sports Pavilion's pitches frozen, the game was changed at the last minute to be played at Seaford.

With many of the squad commuting from London and Essex, players arrived late and unprepared, and several did not make it until after the game had kicked off.

Boss Mick Buckingham admitted the change of ground affected the team.

"We had a nightmare," he said. "When I took over at Lingfield, we worked a lot on preparation. We got training back up to where it should be, and worked on the warm- ups, but against Seaford we were rushed and the boys weren't mentally prepared."

Lingfield's unsettled start to the day showed from kick off when they conceded after just four minutes from Seaford's Thomas Callaghan. This was added to on the stroke of half-time when keeper Dan Burnett misjudged a cross from Adam Kneller and the ball floated over his head. The Surrey side were able to get a goal back in the 70th minute through Nytram Baker, who got on the end of an Andy Dalhouse cross, but were unable to level the scores.

"The second Seaford goal killed us," Buckingham explained.

"If we had put a little bit more effort in then I think we could have got a result. We started to push them in the second half, and I pushed the centre-half, Baker, up front, but we couldn't get the second goal."

Despite the disappointment of the South Coast, Buckingham is taking the positives and looking ahead.

"We maybe put in a lot of effort recently against Eastbourne and Redhill and this was the result," he said.

"We had a couple of youth teams boys in our team at Seaford, and I've had reports of a couple in the reserves that are doing well."