‘It was bizarre’ – Baffins Milton Rovers’ Wessex League game at Pagham postponed five minutes before kick off

Both sets of players had completed their warm-ups on the Nyetimber Lane pitch and were back in the dressing rooms when the news was delivered.

Persistent rain - that forced the postponement of the entire Wessex League fixture list last night - was the reason why.

Baffins boss Danny Thompson, whose team made the 44-mile round trip for nothing, told The News: ‘It was bizarre.

‘We were ready to go out when the assistant linesman came into our dressing room and said could he have a word.

‘I went to the referees’ room and the ref said he was calling it off. I said ‘you’re joking’.

‘I’ve played on pitches like that, it was no worse than the pitch we played on at Portchester (earlier this month).

‘The referee said he could start the game but he was 99 per cent sure he’d have to call it off at some point.

‘Brad Gale had travelled up from Bournemouth to play, Tom Vincent had travelled down from Newbury … surely a little bit of common sense could have been had?

‘Surely the ref could have seen the long-term weather forecast?

‘If we’d started I’m confident it would have been fine.

‘It was bizarre to let us do the warm-ups and then call it off five minutes before kick off.

‘They should have called it off at 5pm or gone for it.’

As it stands, the Wessex League season has to be wrapped up by Saturday week, April 22.

Due to other fixtures, there is no available date for last night’s game to be rescheduled - unless it results in teams playing twice in 48 hours.

One solution could be moving Pagham’s trip to Alresford scheduled for next Tuesday to next Thursday, and hosting Baffins on the Tuesday instead.

As it stands, Baffins have a free date next Tuesday but host Horndean on the Thursday. Neither Alresford or Pagham are playing next Thursday.

Whatever happens, it is a logistical headache. ‘You’ve got someone like Horndean (who have six games left) going for the title - how are they going to fit their games in?’ asked Thompson. ‘I don’t know what’s going to happen.’