Rooks knocked off their perch by a Hornet's sting

Lewes don't look much like league leaders, as Horsham continue a good run in the Isthmian League.

He hallucinated a dog, yesterday morning. I think it may have been sitting inside the video cabinet, and what sort of breed it might have been was unclear. To be honest, when you think of hallucinations and dementia, your mind automatically defaults to some form of screaming into the void, but on this occasion he seemed quite pleased to see it, though I did have to dissuade him from getting up to pet it. I let it pass, but it was noted in the report, this morning. It’s dadsitting weekend, again.

It's a long walk to Horsham FC from the northern side of the town, but I've eschewed the offer of a lift from my brother-in-law to traipse it. At lunchtime, we settled down and watched the first half of the Spurs vs West Ham match and groaned when Spurs went behind. They were level by half-time when I left, pretty sure of the route but less certain how long it might take.

The Worthing Road is one of the main arteries out of the centre of the town in a southerly direction. Follow it far enough and you wind up either somewhere near my house or with wet ankles. The town centre, a higgledy-piggledy mixture of very old and very new buildings, is bustling, and wandering through it takes me past a pretty church and through a memorial garden that feels slightly like it might have been imagined by AA Milne.

The ground itself is just outside of the southern limits of the town in Southwater, a village barely a couple of miles from the town centre. Worthing Road is busy and, as it turns out, not especially easy to cross. I pause briefly to smile at the sign for local boarding school Christ's Hospital (“Excuse me, doctor; where might I find the stigmata ward?”), but otherwise it's a pleasant walk on a warm, sunny day. I should have left my fancy new big coat at home.

The weather forecast, fortunately, had come good. It had predicted a dreadful morning of rain followed by an afternoon of sunshine. Horsham have an artificial playing surface, so the weather would have to be far worse for this one to fall foul of it, but I did watch “GAME OFF” trending on social media as matches elsewhere fell like skittles. There's little to suggest that this won't be another difficult winter, in that respect.

Horsham are a cup team. They've already proved that in this year's FA Cup and FA Trophy. But can they replicate that in the league? They've won four and lost three of their eight games so far. The good news there is that the nature of the Isthmian League Premier Division this season seems to be that just about anyone can beat just about anyone. Horsham start the game in tenth place, but if results go their way they could well be top of the table by the end of November. They won 5-0 on Tuesday night.

Lewes, meanwhile, started the season excellently and are still top at 3pm despite having only taken a point from their last two games, a 5-0 tonking at Potters Bar Town and a 2-2 draw against Billericay Town. They've brought at least a couple of hundred of supporters with them this afternoon, but if there is any momentum prior going into kick-off this afternoon, it's probably behind the home team.

The Fusion Aviation Stadium is well-appointed and new. It's swaddled in trees on both sides and the yellow and green colours of the home team are everywhere. Opposite the seated stand sit two small covered terraces interrupted by a media centre on stilts and dugouts in the centre.

There's cover at one end, but the main attraction is at the other end, nearest to where you enter the ground, where the bar also acts as a makeshift terrace. Black netting is strung up behind the goal to prevent too many pints from going flying or windows from smashing. Considering the disaster that was the sale of their former ground on Queen Street, near the town centre, this is a plenty acceptable home for this level of the game. And for a new ground—they only moved in six years ago—it does noticeably feel like ‘home’.

There's one small problem with this ‘home’ on a sunny afternoon that can't really be avoided. This pitch is shiny. With the sun stubbornly refusing to set, the stadium is absolutely bathed in sunshine, though the glare coming up off the pitch can be close to distracting. Still better than the game being called off because a mild shower has saturated it, though, as was the case at many other venues today.

Because I got to the ground an absurdly early 45 minutes before kick-off, I have time for a pint and a cheeseburger which, to my delight, has had the design of a football stamped into the top of it. Elsewhere, the club's green and yellow striped hornet mascot—don't come at me, I'm not a lepidopterist and even I already know that hornets are yellow and black—is doing a roaring trade high-fiving kids from a youth football team who are apparently besotted with him. By the time kick-off comes around, there's a healthy crowd of 1,363 inside the Community Stadium.

It doesn't take very long for Lewes’s afternoon to start to fall to pieces, when a defensive mix-up allows Charlie Hester-Cook to score from close range. It's the sort of goal that shakes people awake as they're still emerging from the bar, blinking into the sunlight. There's nothing like an early goal at a football match to cause dozens of cricked necks at the same time. The early goal shifts the dynamic of the game. Lewes are chasing from the outset, and Horsham—who've been in decent form and are well-placed to push up the table if they can win the games hand created by their cup runs—control the half with considerable comfort. Indeed, it's difficult to recall them having a shot on target all afternoon.

The first half is non-descript enough for my mind to wander elsewhere. I noted before kickoff that the electronic scoreboard behind the goal was advertising the musical talents of one Stan Solo in the bar after the match. Now, I'm a big fan of live music and I've never been a groupie (I've not purchased that plaster-casting kit yet, but am hovering over the ‘buy it now’ button), but I also know fully well that I don't fancy another four mile walk home and that I can get a lift back off my brother-in-law, who, to the best of my knowledge, is not a Stan Solo superfan. It's still 1-0 at half’-time, by the way.

Lewes are improved throughout the early stages of the second half, but dominating possession isn't the same as creating chances and they don't do a great deal of that. Horsham seem reasonably happy to sit back and absorb the pressure, while Lewes keep getting to about 35 yards from their opponents’ goal and then forgetting what they are supposed to do with the ball. Horsham have the better chances, but aren't quite able to put them away, though this is broadly a game of few clearcut opportunities.

The decisive moment comes with twenty minutes to play, when Peter Ojemen is sent off for a slightly reckless tackle. It didn't, in all honesty, quite meet my own personal criteria for a straight red card, but the pushing and shoving in which he became immediately involved probably didn't help with the referee's perception of the incident. As per tradition, he trudged towards the tunnel in the corner of the ground to a soundtrack of, “Cheerio, cheerio, cheerio”, which is now the only recorded way in which the word ‘cheerio’ is still used in this country beyond being the name of an American breakfast cereal.

Ojemen's dismissal turns out to be the final snuffing out of Lewes's realistic chances of taking anything from this game. Lewes are still pressuring without intent, but when they lose possession there are more gaps when Horsham counter-attack and seven minutes after the dismissal Horsham break on the right, and a scuffed pass across the penalty area is rolled over the line by James Hammond to put the result beyond reasonable doubt.

Even a not-insubstantial amount of stoppage-time—the sending off incident alone took more than three minutes to resolve from the point of the foul to the point of the free-kick being taken—gives no indication of setting up some sort of grandstand finish. I crane my neck slightly at the final whistle, hoping to hear a bit of Stan Solo soundchecking, but regrettably I don't get to hear anything. Still, at least the lift home allows me the opportunity to check out the park and ride. It looks like a car park. Not sure what else I might have expecting there, but I guess that's us non-drivers for you.

Lewes aren't top of the table by the end of the afternoon. That honour now belongs to Dover Athletic, who are above Billericay Town by goal difference. But with this season's race for the Isthmian League title already starting to resemble the Mascots Grand National, there's all to play for and likely will be for some time. The win nudges Horsham up to seventh in the table from tenth, but winning their two games would put them above Lewes into third, just a point behind the joint-leaders. If they can not get too distracted by the cups an improvement on last season, when they finished 5th and lost on penalty kicks in the play-off semi-finals, seems distinctly possible.

Back at the ranch, he's settled in his chair when I get home with fish and chips about half an hour after the final whistle. There hasn't been much schadenfreude going around for Spurs supporters of late, so we watch the match between Bournemouth and Arsenal on the television with a warming sense of glee in the pits of our stomachs. With Spurs winning handsomely at lunchtime, for once Match of the Day will be worth watching this weekend. We are, however, both in bed by 10.30. Age takes an obvious toll on the body.