Painters blasts his players’ performance at the Lions’ den

Heath always struggle with player availability for midweek away games and this was no exception with three players becoming unavailable on the morning of the match to add to those already ruled out due to injury, suspension, holiday and work commitments.

Manager Steve Painter had to make a number of changes to his team for the trip to Pagham with Dan Attwater partnering Martyn Flack in the heart of the defence and bringing Adam Wicking and Scott Weller into the starting line-up.

The visitors had the better of the early chances with Tiago Andrade’s overhead kick from a Stuart Chester cross deflected wide and Scott Weller having his shot charged down from the resulting corner.

The Lions’ first goal-scoring opportunity came in the eighth minute when Dan Simmonds hit a right-foot shot from distance that Heath keeper Michael Chester saved well low to his right.

The lively forward was posing a real threat and with better finishing could have had a hat-trick in the first 30 minutes as the home dominated play.

The only goal of the half came five minutes before the break as a long throw caught out the defence and Dan Kempson ran through to score under the advancing Chester.

After a few choice words from Painter at the break, Weller’s free kick was swung in at the near post and avoided everyone to end up in the back of the net, but the linesman spotted an infringement and disallowed the goal.

Pagham’s Rob Brown got on the score sheet in the 54th minute when he dispossessed Jamal Sultan, cut inside and hit a right-foot shot from the edge of the penalty area that flew into the bottom corner.

Midway through the half, Heath were awarded a corner that was cleared by the Pagham defence and a long ball up to Simmonds saw the forward sprint away to score.

In the 75th minute, Simmonds added a fourth with another counter-attack from a Heath free-kick that was cleared. Things could have been worse for Heath when Dan Attwater brought down a player in the penalty area but Kempson’s spot kick crashed against the crossbar.

Painter said: “This was probably the worse performance since I’ve been at the club. We’ve had teams where the players have far less ability but they gave you more effort.

“The players’ performance has made Saturday’s team selection much easier for me, with six senior players coming back into the side there’s nobody apart from the Chesters and Scott who could possibly argue about not starting.”

Heath: M.Chester, Sultan (Helsdown 75), Wicking, Attwater, Flack, S.Chester, Weller, Moore, Holmes (O’Sullivan 70) Andrade, Martin (Legrange 65).

Don’t miss out on all the latest breaking news where you live.

Here are four ways you can be sure you’ll be amongst the first to know what’s going on.

1 Make this website your homepage

2 Like our Facebook page at facebook.com/pages/Sport-Sussex

3 Follow us on Twitter @SportSussex

4 Register with us by clicking on ‘sign in’ (top right corner). You can then receive our daily newsletter AND add your point of view to stories that you read here.

And do share with your family and friends - so they don’t miss out!