Late man Phillips keeps Stones on top

If it was not quite as catastrophic as the previous week, when Casuals managed only a draw against Merstham despite leading 6-1 after an hour, it was arguably even more frustrating.

Casuals, who had parted company with manager Mick Sullivan during the week, defied the table-toppers for 89 minutes and then snatched the lead through Kierran Dias. Stones got off the hook with an equaliser from Michael Phillips deep into added time. Without that goal Casuals would have been off the bottom and Stones off the top.

As it is, Maidstone lead on goal difference from Hythe, though they and the rest of the top five have all played two games more than the leaders.

Hythe were 4-3 winners at Worthing, whose Tom Lawley was the only one of the league’s ten hat-trick men not to finish on the winning side. Lawley, in fact, opened the scoring in the second minute. A Dave Cook penalty and a Taser Hassan goal turned it round by the 14th minute.

A 25-yarder from Lawley squared matters again after 32 minutes only for Hythe to respond with goals from Cook and Nick Reeves in the next four minutes. Lawley was on target again five minutes after half-time but Rebels could not find the net again.

Dulwich held on to third place coming from behind to beat Herne Bay 2-1 at Champion Hill. Calum McGeehan’s free-kick put the visitors in front just before the interval: Ellis Green replied midway through the second half and set up the winner for Kevin James with six minutes left.

Crawley Down also needed a late winner for their welcome 2-1 home win over Eastbourne and they are fourth, only three points off the pace, despite having taken just one point from their previous five games. Man of the match Luke Blewden gave the Anvils a 20th-minute lead which was wiped out by Matt Geard ten minutes after the break. The hosts dominated but it looked as if victory would again elude them until Gabriel Odunaike made the breakthrough with two minutes left.

Burgess Hill complete the top five after their 1-0 victory at Walton & Hersham. The hosts had Aryan Tajbakhsh sent off at the end of the first half and Pat Harding won it with a 73rd-minute header, his – and his team’s - eighth goal in three games.

After their amazing comeback a week earlier, Merstham saw the other side of the coin as they went down 2-1 at home to Faversham despite taking the lead through Liam Wright’s header with only 14 minutes left. Renford Tenyue hit back and Adrian Stone nabbed the winner well into added time.

Stuart King took his league goal tally to 15, the best in any division, with a hat-trick in Folkestone’s 3-1 home win over Three Bridges. Folkestone had slipped well into the bottom half of the table and were seventh among the eight Kent clubs in the division. Their bad run looked set to continue when Joel O’Hara scored for Bridges in the 24th minute.

King turned it round with two goals in the last three minutes of the half, the first a penalty, and made sure with four minutes left. That lifted Folkestone to tenth, although it did not improve their position in the Kent pecking order.

Bridges dropped to 21st, below Whitstable who climbed two places with a 1-0 home win over Chipstead. The Oystermen had sacked manager Justin Luchford during the week. Scott Heard’s 77th-minute goal (pictured by Les Biggs) was enough for three vital points, and they deserved them.

Tempers frayed at Sittingbourne, where 11 yellow cards were shown and Tooting’s Taurean Roberts was sent off in the second half. The hosts won 2-0 with a 23rd-minute goal from Hicham Akhazzan and a late Ryan Golding penalty.

Horsham, who chalked up two away wins in the first week of last season, finally ended their long wait for another one with a 2-1 victory at Leatherhead. The sides exchanged penalties in the first ten minutes, with Tommy Hutchings converting for the Tanners and Ryan Woodford replying. Scott Tipper, recently signed from Worthing, scored the winner ten minutes before the interval.

Ramsgate wasted no time at Corinthian-Casuals. Both goals in their 2-0 win came in the first eight minutes, from Tom Chapman and Macauley Murray. Ian Pulman several times went close to increasing the lead.