Bexhill Utd fell to a narrow defeat in a tough battle with second placed Steyning Town at The Polegrove on Saturday afternoon.

Pirates boss Jay Skinner-Swain shuffled the pack again and with skipper Richie Welch unavailable, Dale Penn was drafted into central defence alongside Dan Rogers with Harvey Mapstone slotting in at left back.

The whole defensive unit were in for a busy afternoon as the Barrowmen looked to extend a winning streak of a dozen on the bounce.

The 150 strong crowd had hardly settled into their seats when less than two minutes in Joe Benn found himself one on one with Stef Akras but the Pirates keeper managed to block from point blank range. It was a warm up for repeated raids on the Bexhill lines and it was all hands on deck to keep the scores level.

But, it wasn’t all one way traffic and in increasingly difficult weather conditions as the rain and wind swirled round the Polegrove the home side managed to put some moves together, the best of them a trademark chipped effort from Jack Shonk narrowly missed the target.

Just before the break Town carved out a couple of good chances themselves but Bexhill stood firm and the teams went into the break at 0-0.

The weather had really closed in by the time the teams back onto the pitch with horizontal squalls driving in from the west, illuminated by the glare of the lights.

Both sides got their heads down and on with the task in hand and a credit to them that they managed to play some decent football despite the conditions.

On 65 minutes an attempted back header from the visitors fell short and presented Ryan Moir with a clear chance that he just failed to untangle from his feet and get away, that proving to be a pivotal moment in the game.

That seemed to fire Steyning up and five minutes later they broke the deadlock. A deep ball in from the left proved tricky to deal with in the conditions and substitute Evan Hoarty banged it home at the far post.

Ten minutes from time they doubled their lead as some nice approach play saw the ball find it’s way to the in-form Benn who finished with power.

Two nil might have been the cue for Bexhill to fold but far from it, they dug in and gave it a proper go for the final ten minutes, blasting over with three minutes remaining but getting their reward in stoppage time as Nathan Crabb bundled the ball home despite some Steyning protests waved away by the officials.

However, it was too little too late and the points went back down the coast to cement the Barrowmen’s position in the slipstream of Haywards Heath Town.

The Pirates can take credit for giving their opponents a proper work out and finding hard to the death. Next Saturday Bexhill head west to take on Wick whilst Steyning host struggling Shoreham.

Courtesy of Geoff Martin.