Neil Cugley paid tribute to the quality of striker Paul Booth after his derby double earned Folkestone Invicta another memorable festive win over Hythe Town.

Booth made it 12 goals in nine games since he joined the club in November with a double to secure the points at Reachfields on Boxing Day, after Hythe had come back from 2-0 down to level.

Booth was left unmarked to fire a free-kick past Dan Eason on 25 minutes and an inch-perfect Chris Elliot free-kick doubled the lead on the hour.

Despite missing Shaun Welford (suspended) and Pat Kingwell (unavailable), Hythe rallied in front of a crowd of 824 and Kieran Byrne pulled one back on 68 minutes before Louis Sprosen took advantage of a Tim Roberts mistake to level 10 minutes later.

However, Booth won it 10 minutes from time as he cut in from the right before firing into the corner.

Cugley said: “Boothy’s quality was the difference between the sides. At 2-0 up we should have put it to bed and it nearly came back to haunt us but we had a bit of quality to win it.”

He added: “Boothy won’t go anywhere, he loves the club. He’ll keep plugging along but he’s not our only goalscorer, Johan Ter Horst and Dane Luchford have done well, those three are causing teams problems.

“Getting Boothy in has been massive but the turnaround (from bottom four in October to top-five in December) happened before.

“Getting Michael Yianni to the club was a good move, he’s been around the circuit a while and Micheal Everitt also had a big say.

“Roland Edge is a bit of an unsung hero too. He might not look like a world-beater but he’s a good organiser for us.

“We didn’t have him early in the season but we’ve only lost twice when we’ve had him in the side and one of those was Ebbsfleet. He makes a big difference for us.

“With knowledgeable players like him, Boothy, Everitt and Yianni, it brings us a bit more experience and we’re a lot stronger now than we were earlier in the season.”