Leatherhead's run to the first round of the FA Cup last season was a distant memory as this season's hopes of a good run were swept away at Dartford's impressive new stadium on Saturday.

Their hopes were largely dashed on the half hour when target man Joe Sheerin was sent off for retalliating to a bad challenge from Darts skipper Adam Flanagan, who escaped with a yellow card.

Both teams had suffered from nerves at the start with neither settling on the ball and giving away possession on a regular basis. The Darts are a physical side and this was demonstrated within the first few minutes when Tanners goalkeeper Paul McCarthy was comprehensively taken out by home centre back John Guest.

Shortly after that, top scorer Jay May was booked for body checking Steve Sargent.

Dartford should have taken the lead after 25 minutes.

May was left clear to meet a cross with the Tanners defence sleeping. For a prolific scorer this was an inexcusable miss as his header screwed wide of the post.

Then came Sheerin's red card from referee Lloyd Wood after lengthy conferences with his two linesmen.

Despite being down to 10 men, the Tanners held their own in a half that saw plenty of midfield action but very few chances being created. Sargent, again, was the recipient of some harsh treatment with Brad Potter booked for a foul on the Tanners midfielder.

Referee Wood was getting more of the centre stage than one would hope from an official!

It was the second half that saw Dartford take advantage of the gaps that a ten man team was likely to leave.

Although Leatherhead started by taking the game to their hosts, the pace was always likely to tell against them.

Scott Forrester gave them a glimmer of home when his quick turn inside the area gave him enough space to hit a cross shot that rolled wide and Gavin Bolger continued to contest every ball and drive the Tanners forward.

Dartford's breakthrough came after eight minutes of the re-start.

After some pressure involving Cass and Jamie Coyle, a corner from the right was flicked on at the near post to find Cass lurking close in his unchallenged header found the net with ease.

The game was winging from end to end and Dave Harlow introduced some fresh legs with the introduction of Julian Thompson, Ben Shannon and Aaron Murphy.

Despite a Thompson affort that went wide with one of his first touches, Cass grabbed his second with 15 minutes left to go.

This time a through ball found him with time to slip the ball under McCarthy to put the game beyond a tiring Leatherhead Despite the prompting of youngsters Shannon and Murphy, Leatherhead lacked the firepower to pull the game back and, with just a minute left on the clock, sub Tom Bradbrook completed the scoring.

It was not just the Sheerin dismissal that turned this game. The hugely influential Neil Baker suffered a recurrence of a back injury and had to leave the field before the goals started to go in.

Leatherhead: McCarthy, Beer (Thompson), Gray, Hendry, Baker (Shannon), Holmes, Sargent, Bolger, Sheerin, Forrester, Marshall (Murphy).