After heavy rain in the early part of the week, Paddock Wood's Elm Tree Ground was declared unplayable as early as Wednesday afternoon, meaning that the game was switched to Prime's Cadogan ground.

Prime made just one change in personnel from their defeat to Leigh with Sykes returning to replace Skovborg-Hansen on the left-wing. There was also a tactical switch with the diminutive Fitzgerald switched to full-back and Ellis moved into his central-midfield role as he celebrated his 100th Prime appearance.

Buckland was joined by Nowak and Cary on the bench with Harris, Flamank and Barker all missing out on the 14 altogether.

The young visiting side started brightly and with several Prime players seemingly in dreamland, they nearly opened the scoring but Kerton managed to keep them out.

It was a calamitous start with Sander seemingly having his boots on the wrong feet, Abu uncharacteristically beaten to 50/50's and Ferguson painfully isolated up front.

Luckily for Prime the defensive spine of their side was holding firm with Turvey and Williams imperious in the air and in the tackle and captain for the day Ellis winning more than his fair share of headers in the heart of the pitch.

Prime were looking more likely down their right with Fitzgerald keeping 'Wood's left-winger quiet and feeding Henshall whose quick feet got him into some dangerous positions.

Ferguson came closest to giving Prime the lead as he cut in from the left and curled an effort just over the bar. Excell came close soon after with a chip of his own which again sailed narrowly over the bar.

Sykes sent some trademarked left-footed bullets into the danger zone but his effectiveness was being stunted by some crude tackles from the visitors and the offside flag which seemed to be going up every time Prime got into 'Wood territory.

Ferguson then held off his markers but the keeper got a finger on his shot to tip it onto the post and away to safety.

It remained goalless at the break and Prime knew that they needed to dig deep to get the 3 points on a difficult pitch against difficult opponents.

Prime continued to press after the interval but Ferguson was again foiled by the visiting keeper and Sykes blasted wide after skipping passed a couple of tackles down the left.

With an hour gone, Goldsmith sent on Buckland and Cary for the stricken Turvey and Sander, with Fitzgerald switched across to left-back.

The game was now anybody's and Paddock Wood hit the post when their substitute toe-poked passed Kerton - but the post this time came to Prime's rescue.

Skipper Ellis was replaced by Nowak with cramp setting in. Henshall moved infield and Nowak took his place in front of Buckers.

The home side then got a lucky break when Ferguson's centre struck the upper arm of the Paddock Wood full-back and the ref who had made some puzzling decisions all afternoon pointed to the spot.

The visiting bench understandably went berserk but after the commotion had died down, Prime needed to find a penalty taker in the absence of Carl Barker. Jamie Sykes stepped up and decided that the best course of action was to smash the ball as hard as he could. The ball flew in off the underside of the bar with the keeper perhaps relieved to get out of the way.

Paddock Wood then threw everything forward for the last 10 minutes and they had the ball in the net with 5 minutes to go. They broke well down the right and their winger again toe-ended a shot passed Kerton, but with the ball seemingly going in, their striker tapped the ball home but he was in an offside position and Goldsmith's flag saved Prime.

The frustration got the better of 'Wood and one of their midfielders saw red for swearing at the ref.

Prime still had to defend a couple of corners in a frenzied finish, but they held on to claim the points.

Paddock Wood will take points off of other sides this season and this might prove to be a much better result than it looked at full-time - especially as most of the Prime starting XI were off-colour today.