A depleted First Team, with a 14 man squad including joint manager Lee Flavin and coach Aaron Bogle turned in a superb battling performance to pick up a much needed three points away at Horndean.
With injuries and unavailabilities affecting the squad, there was a somewhat unfamiliar side that took to the field – with five changes to the side that lost against Ashford Town, with only Kacper Orlowski, Bert Lloyd, Steven Sylvestre-Adujua, Isaac Kamin, Frankie Maciocia and Christian Adugyamfi remaining. Coming into the line up were club legend and coach Aaron Bogle (racking up his 259th appearance), Jake Rumble, Torin Ngete (first start) and Harvey Maudner and Lauric Diakiesse making their debuts.
18 minutes into the game and a long throw dropped to the Deans skipper Tommy Scutt but his well struck effort on the half volley went wide of Orlowskis right hand post, and midway through the half, Liam Callaghan saw his shot well saved by Orlowski, with Rudi Blankson firing the loose ball over the bar.
We opened the scoring shortly before the first half interval. A ball into the area was only half cleared and fell to Maciocia, who drilled a low shot on the half volley into the bottom corner for 1-0, his first goal for the club, and gave us a lead at the break.
The Deans almost levelled on the hour, but Callaghans close range effort bought another good save out of Orlowski.
We effectively sealed the win ten minutes from time when Maciocia swung over a corner and Adugyamfi powerfully headed home for 2-0.
Late on we introduced joint manager Lee Flavin, Daniel Pepple and another debutant in Remi Onabanjo and saw out the game for a vital three points.