After dominating their semi-final battle with Bridport they lost 1-0.
Afterwards assistant manager Martin Cassidy was ‘gutted’ but immensely proud of his young team on a bitterly cold night at the Hamworthy Stadium in Bournemouth.
‘They only had one chance all night .
.
.
we were caught sleeping,’ he said.
By way of contrast the Saints carved out a series of opportunities but fate and bad luck conspired to deny them the goals their efforts deserved.
‘The ball just wouldn’t go in,’ said Cassidy.
‘We peppered their goal all the way through: we had at least five clear-cut chances.
If we’d have won 5-1 I’d have been saying it should have been seven or eight.
In the second half our goalkeeper Daniel Evans was on the halfway line just watching and playing a sweeper,’ he said.
In addition the Jersey side had two penalty appeals for handball turned down.
The Bridport goal came against the run of play in the 48th minute.
A free kick wide on the right was quickly swept in and wing back Simon Austin was at the far post to head the ball into the net.
Paul Durans had two chances in the first five minutes, then Craig Leitch blasted a 20-yarder which the Bridport ‘keeper couldn’t hold by Lucas Parker failed to turn the ball home.
It was a pattern which continued after the break when Parker had two more good chances and several others went begging.
But Cassidy insisted: ‘I’m coming home a proud guy.
Our boys were brilliant – nobody let us down.
We were the best team for 90 minutes and if we’d scored one we’d have scored more.’ St Pauls: Daniel Evans, Stuart André, Lee Bradshaw, Shaun Irvine, Jamie Allan, Steven Jones, Dave Watson, Lucas Parker, Danny Hughes, Glen Durans, Craig Leitch.
Subs: Ross Gibson (for Durans, 80); Jay Cassidy (for Parker, 80; JP Martin (for Hughes, 70).
