FA Cup dreams live on for Epsom and Ewell and Banstead Athletic (From Your Local Guardian)

FA Cup dreams live on for Epsom and Ewell and Banstead Athletic

11:36am Thursday 25th August 2011 in CCL By Matt Maltby

Epsom & Ewell and Banstead Athletic can still hope of a dream appearance at Wembley and FC Cup glory after both teams won their respective FA Cup extra preliminary round matches last weekend, writes Matt Maltby.

Epsom defeated Croydon 3-1 at home, with Jamie Summers and the strike partnership of Robbie Burns and Mark Jarman securing their passage through to the next round, where they will host Chipstead on September 3.

The Salts have been struggling to field a side with a majority of key players either injured or unavailable, including club-captain Alex Rodrigues, who is on holiday.

Manager Lyndon Buckwell has added James Moon on loan from Kingstonian and the returning Jamie Hatfield to his squad though.

They managed to give leaders Guildford City a run for their money in the Combined Counties League on Tuesday night before losing 3-2 to an 87th minute winner.

Matt Smith and Alex McGregor twice put them in front but two games in three days proved too much.

Banstead, who remain winless in the league this season, replicated Epsom’s success and secured their first win of the season with an impressive 3-0 defeat of Woodstock Sports, with Tom Jellie, Luke Gay and Steve Tyson getting on the score sheet.

They play Arundel in the next round.