Upper Beeding crashed out of the Malcolm Simmonds Memorial Cup at the hands of The Ship on Saturday.

The Ship took the lead in the first minute. Beeding skipper John Burgesss gave the ball away in midfield to Steve Jenkins. His cross was chested down by Beeding centre half Steve Barber and Ian Higgins nipped in between Barber and goalkeeper Scott Redfern to finish with ease from eight yards.

Beeding were unlucky not to hit back soon afterwards when both Gary Salter and Paul Barker missed the target from inside the box and Sean Edwards' corner was headed from under the crossbar by Mark Irish.

Gary Salter again missed the target in the 23rd minute, heading over his brother Marks' delicately flighted free kick. 4 minutes later another Edwards corner had the Ship defence in chaos, this time Gary Salter heading back across goal only to see David smith head straight at Lee Montegue in the Ship goal.

The Ship also had their chances with Jenkins heading wide from Tony McLeishs' cross, Ian Higgins grazing the Beeding crossbar from an acute angle and Darren Holden driving the ball just over from 30 yards.

If the start to the 1st half was explosive, the 2nd was equally so. Many of the eighty odd spectators were still in the tea bar when Mark Salter won a corner directly from the kick off. Edwards expect delivery was met by the head of Gary Salter for the equalising goal.

The ensuing 25 minutes was all Upper Beeding, with The Ship hanging on grimly with Edwards Burgess and Barker orchestrating most of Beedings probing attacks. However, when you have as much of the game as Beeding had it is imperative that you score.

Barber had a header cleared off the line and volleyed over from 8 yards, Barker headed wide from 6 yards and both smith and Gary Salter spurned opportunities to put the game beyond their opponents.

The warning signs were evident when Barber gave away a free kick on the edge of his own penalty area after 68 minutes, Mark Spicers curling free kick had to be scrambled away at the foot of the post by Redfern.

Beeding were forced to replace Burgess (knee) and Smith (groin) with Lee Johnson and Stuart Barry and with 15 minutes remaining were caught cold when Jenkins fed Higgins and the small striker made no mistake in beating Redfern having out sprinted both Jamie Ireson and Vic Gretton.

Higgins could have wrapped the game up 3 minutes from time in a replica move of the second goal and as they pushed forward, Jenkins again found Higgins in space enough to beat Redfern with a powerful right foot shot.

Beeding manager Mick Barry was far from happy with his teams finishing, he said "we had 80% of the possession today, and some of our approach play was excellent. We had our opportunities to kill the game and did not take them. We missed too many chances, defended naively and have paid the price for our deficiencies".

Beeding: Redfern; Ireson, V.Gretton, Barber; S.Gretton, Burgess (capt), Edward's, Barker, M.Salter; G.Salter, Smith.

Subs: Johnson (Burgess 69), Barry (Smith 70), Parsons (not used).

Match Report submitted by Nick Addison.