Town deservedly beaten at Worthing as stop-start season continues

The Shaymen could have no complaints as they were a distant second best throughout the game, trailing 2-1 at the break and never looking like getting back level.

They did thanks to Will Hugill after Joe Cook put the hosts ahead, only for Jordan Young to prove the match-winner.

Hugill's goal was a bit of a get-out-of-jail goal after Worthing had started much better and brighter.

A corner was headed in by Cook from around eight yards out to cap an opening six minutes in which the hosts had come flying out of the blocks and Town simply hadn't matched them.

It could have been worse when Max Bardell got caught under the ball, leading to an effort on goal from a tight angle by Cory Adjetey-Brew, which True Grant parried.

Hugill brought Town level with a shot from the right of the box that beat keeper Taylor Seymour at his near post, but shouldn't have, after a lovely through ball to him from Ben Tollitt.

That was as good as it got for the rest of the half for Halifax though, with Worthing the far more cohesive and threatening team.

Not for the first time, some lovely play by the impressive Razzaq Coleman on right of the box was met with with a first time shot by Adjetey-Brew that he blazed over.

Coleman was giving Tristan Gill a torrid time down the Worthing right, turning him inside out before his shot across goal went wide.

Worthing deserved to lead at half-time, and did so thanks to Young's touch to a shot across goal by Adjetey-Brew, but it stemmed from a poor pass out in the right back position by Trusty to Gill, who was caught on the ball, and before that, a pass out from the back by Grant when the ball should just have been cleared upfield.

But it summed up the half, with Town lethargic and Worthing bang on it.

Town continued to make no impact as an attacking force after the restart, desperately struggling to even have some sustained possession in the Worthing half.

Right from the off, the game had felt like a lower league side playing a cup tie at a higher division team, and little was happening to change that.

And it went from bad to worse when half-time sub Crowe was shown a straight red for dragging down a Worthing substitute Emmerson Sutton, who'd been isolated one-on-one with the Halifax defender from a long clearance by the keeper.

Carty did brilliantly late on to put in a cross from the left but substitute Cruz Allen couldn't connect, moments before Coleman was denied at the other end by a double save from Grant.

Worthing: Seymour, Colbran, Moore, Waller, Cook, Adjetey-Brew, Wadham (Ransom 86), Aguiar, Coleman, Young (Sutton 70), Kendall (Smith 90). Subs not used: De La Cruz, Packham, Spicer, Boddy.

Scorers: Cook (7), Young (39)

Attempts on target: 3

Attempts off target: 11

Corners: 6

Halifax: Grant, Conte (Wainman 62), Bardell, Hobson, Gill (Crowe 46), C Johnson, Trusty, Tollitt (Morgan-Smith 74), Hugill (Douglas 74), McDermott (C Allen 86), Carty. Subs not used: Johnson, Gilsenan.

Scorer: Hugill (17)

Attempts on target: 1

Attempts off target: 3

Corners: 2

Attendance: 2,635 (140 away)

Referee: Dan Blades

Town man of the match: Cody Johnson. Comfortably Town's best player on the day, showed his quality when few other Halifax players did.