Kingstonian manager, Leigh Dynan, has endured lows in his 15-month tenure but a 3-2 home defeat to Worthing may represent a fresh nadir, writes Taimour Lay.

Trailing 3-0 midway through the second period, and with the away team wasting a one-on-one to extend the lead even further, doubts over the Dynan project – allayed since a productive Autumn – re-emerged with full force.

For the first time Dynan was unsparing in his public criticism of an expensively-assembled squad. “I am so annoyed,” he said. “I’ve protected the players at the beginning of the season but today wasn’t good enough. You can’t give teams a three-goal advantage, I don’t care who you are.

“It’s so poor. I'm livid. Yes, we’ve done OK going forward but it doesn’t matter. The defenders in this group need to sort themselves out sharpish. I’m not having it anymore.

"People with reputations coming into this club, coming into this league and thinking they have a reputation because they’ve played higher. I don’t care. It’s about now. It’s all over the place when we don’t have the ball.”

A fourth defeat in a row has K’s languishing in 11th place and the season is slipping away. “We’ve lost 12 points,” lamented Dynan. “Tonbridge it was mentality. Whitehawk was horrendous in the first-half, the mentality again. And at Folkestone I knew we’d struggle and we did. We had one shot in the whole game and conceded two poor goals.”

Debutant midfielder Scott Davies, recruited from Slough Town in the league above, is the latest high-profile recruit.

He became the 49th player to pull on the red-and-white hoops this season and looked an accomplished performer or the most part. But a familiar collapse at the back had K’s reeling.

Joe Clarke, Worthing’s talented 17-year-old, opened the scoring in the 51st minute, cutting inside Andrew Musungu before curling a fine strike past Rob Tolfrey.

Isaac Newton and Ollie Pearce also took advantage of lax defending in a devastating 15-minute spell from the Sussex side, who had been on a poor run of form themselves.

To K’s credit, a last push towards the end salvaged two goals. Davies executed a perfect free-kick from 25 years to make it 3-1 on 77 minutes and Louie Theophanous banged in from close range after a melee inside the area.

There could even have been an equaliser in a chaotic finale when Elliott Buchanan missed a golden opportunity from half a yard with almost the last kick of the game. Worthing keeper Kleton Perntreou made four outstanding saves as utility man Scott Day came on to cause havoc upfront but the damage had already been done at the other end.

K’s host Potters Bar Town on Wednesday evening before a trip to leaders Dorking Wanderers on Saturday.