Stafford Rangers 6 Folkestone Invicta 0

FOLKESTONE Invicta's New Year got off to a disastrous start as they took a bad beating at the a cold Marston Road on Saturday.

It was Invicta's heaviest defeat since their record senior 7-1 loss at Crockenhill back in February 1993 as the floodgates opened after the interval.

Invicta had played quite well during the first half, but fell behind after 39 minutes and collapsed after experienced midfielder Scott Lindsey was carried off with knee ligament trouble after 42 minutes.

It had been a difficult day for Invica all round as they traveled through snowy conditions without defender John Guest who was stuck in traffic after an accident on the Detling Hill and was unable to make the team's rendezvous in Maidstone.

To round off Invicta's day, they returned to their coach for the long journey home to find that opportunist thieves had taken some of thee players' possessions.

Invicta had made a positive start as they were desperately unlucky after nine minutes from their only corner of the game when James Millar shot against the post and then saw his shot saved by the legs of goalkeeper Ryan Price as the ball came back out to him.

But it was Stafford who opened the scoring after 39 minutes courtesy of a great strike from Heath which flew in from outside the penalty area.

It was one-way traffic after the interval as goals from Robin Gibson (48 minutes), Daniel Davidson (55 minutes), Heath (58 miintes) and Paul Szewczyk (80 and 83 minutes) turned it into a rout.