Promoted Horsham bow up in style with ten-goal rout

Having sealed the step-up to South Premier Division 1 with a game to spare last week, Horsham waved goodbye to their current division in emphatic fashion, while their visitors bowed out with a whimper.

Faced with a dead rubber of a game against a Woking team that had already been demoted, Horsham enjoyed a goal-fest at Broadbridge Heath.

Matt Hough netted a hat-trick that took him to equal fourth in the league scorer’s table.

Jack Dean added two to take his season’s total to 23 goals from 22 games to go six clear of the field.

Joey Humphreys also netted two while John Burroughs, Cirdec Atkinson and Richard Blakesley were also on the mark.

At the annual club dinner and awards the same evening, Dean was named both under-21 player of the year and first XI player of the year – both well-deserved accolades.

Young defender Dan Humphreys, who has gone from strength to strength all season, was named most improved player.

He has a big role to play marshalling the back line over the coming seasons.

With all the league play-offs decided, Horsham will now hope to emulate old adversaries like Banbury and Henley who successfully made the upward move last year and have managed to survive in South Premier Division 1.

The league contains well-respected teams like Havant and Spencer, and they will be joined by the once-mighty Guildford who drop down a league.

Horsham net-minder Andrew Isaacs also looks forward to renewing his acquaintance with Bromley and Beckenham, his previous team, who are also on the slide.

Manager Al Campbell feels he deserves special mention for his role this season.

He said: “Jack (Dean) naturally steals all the thunder for his goal tally, but Andrew has been worth at least a goal a game if not more.

“When you have someone unstoppable in the forward line and an unflappable stopper at the back you take three points more often than not.”

The squad now have one more game to play, against Eastbourne in the Sussex Cup final at Lewes on April 23.

But thoughts are already turning to preparations for next season with Al Campbell adding: “We’ll be losing both Jack Dean and utility player Noah Chinn to university. We’ll need to further develop our own academy players, and also possibly recruit fresh blood.

“The first objective will be to survive at the higher level.”

Don’t miss out on all the latest breaking news where you live.

Here are four ways you can be sure you’ll be amongst the first to know what’s going on.

1 Make this website your homepage

2 Like our Facebook page at facebook.com/pages/Sport-Sussex

3 Follow us on Twitter @SportSussex

4 Register with us by clicking on ‘sign in’ (top right corner). You can then receive our daily newsletter AND add your point of view to stories that you read here.

And do share with your family and friends - so they don’t miss out!