On a warm sunny March afternoon, Prime travelled to Tonbridge to face rock-bottom Roselands Reserves with the chance to move up to 2nd in the table.

Prime were without Ellis, Abu and Turvey and Barker's no-show left Prime with just 13. Next up came the news that the referee was late and was not answering his phone, so the game would have to be refereed by one of the players.

Initial negotiations were for the home side to ref the first half and someone from Prime to ref the second, but all 12 Roselands players declined to help out and when a similar response came from his squad, Goldsmith was left with the choice of either refereeing the game himself or cancelling the game and wasting everyone's Saturday afternoon.

So at roughly 2:20, Goldsmith found a whistle and got the game started - ending his hopes of starting his first outfield game since 24th April 2013 after 6 months out injured and 3 months of rain cancellations.

Davis came in at right-back with Mazurkiewicz moved to centre-back to partner the returning Cary. Sykes filled the Ellis/Abu void in midfield and Harris (now the sole substitute) ran the line.

The game started with Prime failing to heed Goldsmith's words of caution to guard against complacency and Roselands dominated the opening 10 minutes with Prime's back 4 a complete shambles.

A bobbly pitch was not helping their cause but Roselands' continued to bombard Kerton's goal with a series of long throws from player/boss Gillham being repelled by anxious Prime defending.

Going forward, Prime were looking dangerous with Henshall and Nowak beating their respective full-backs with ease and Excell seeing plenty of the ball.

From an Excell corner, Prime took an undeserved lead when Cary rose to meet his pin-point centre after missing a similar chance minutes earlier.

The goal did little to settle the visitors though and Roselands' left-winger waltzed his way past 5 or 6 pathetic challenges and into the Prime box before attempting a reverse pass which went awry when a shot at goal seemed obvious.

Prime did put one or two decent moves together - one resulted in Ferguson firing over after a fine passing move. From another foray into the Roselands box, Goldsmith awarded a penalty after the Roselands right-back needlessly tried to control the ball with his arm.

Captain for the day Excell stepped up and sent the keeper the wrong way for his 2nd goal of the season.

Westcott and Sykes appeared to be getting a grip of the midfield but Prime were still guilty of over-committing in attack and leaving the defence badly exposed and a better side would have made them pay.

At the break The Numbers were told to start communicating and to keep their shape and for a short while after the break they actually threatened to look like a side near the top of the league.

Henshall and Excell linked up well down the right and Excell's superb low cross was turned in at the far post by the on-rushing Nowak to make it 3-0.

Five minutes later Westcott and Sykes picked their way through the Roselands defence before Sykes curled in a beauty into the top corner from the corner of the box - a top quality goal in stark contrast to the rest of the 90 minutes!

So at 4-0 with half an hour to go you would think that Prime would help themselves to some more goals but instead they allowed the home side back into the game.

Firstly their winger strolled passed Cary (who looked like he was running through treacle the whole game!) before the defender chopped him down and Goldsmith awarded the 2nd penalty of the game which was despatched to Kerton's right.

Harris came on to replace Nowak but his introduction did little to awaken the visitors. Excell and Henshall continued to look dangerous for Prime going forward but Ferguson was caught offside half a dozen times and Roselands' notoriously weak defence was not tested.

With time ticking down, Roselands scored a second consolation goal which summed up the quality of the match as their winger managed to wriggle past 3 or 4 Prime defenders on the by-line inside the box before toe-poking a weak shot from a seemingly impossible angle beneath Kerton and into the net via the far post with Sander failing to hook it clear.

There was a sombre mood in the changing room after the game with Prime knowing how lucky they had been to escape with the points.

Absentees Ellis, Abu and Turvey should have little trouble getting back into the side for the next game and the player/boss does not intend to miss out on any more game time in his final season in charge.