Ahead of another December away day it’s intriguing to revisit our starting XV when we were edged out by Saturday’s opponents.
The season was young, we had lost one away game, it was September and we were fresh both in body and mind.
This was our starting XV that afternoon when the Worthing Raiders had the punch, pace and enterprise in attack, to win that day, narrowly, 35-26:

Steventon, Ceillam, Currie, Hillier, Merrien, Horrocks, Rice, M. Thomas, Alexandre, Morisio, Quate, J. Batiste, Gow, Aremu, Armstrong.

Fast forward three months and it is fair to say Jordan Reynolds cannot come close to naming the same team for the return match.
Half of them are part of an injury list which, at the most recent count, stood at 22 and come Saturday only 19 players will be taking part in the Worthing match. Going into our final game of 2018 the situation is as gloomy as the shortest-day weather.
The injury list shows no sign of clearing and after the Taunton Titans loss we find ourselves nine points distant of the team sitting one rung clear of the relegation spots.
Some time soon we just have to start winning, but Reynolds reports that after a good squad chat on Tuesday, there is nothing wrong with the spirit.

Yes, confidence is low, but the head coach is not beating himself up about it.
That said, he admitted that 'we have got to start showing a lot more heart', when on the road.
'I think there might be a bit of mental fatigue but I think that has come from losing so many tight games.
'We have been dealt a bad hand [this season] but we had a good meeting on Tuesday.'

As for Worthing, they sit lower mid-table with six wins to date.
They have some dangerous backs but they are not out of our league and the head coach defiantly says that when he looks around the smaller training numbers, he still sees plenty of quality.
In naming a 19-man squad the head coach gives Callum Gladstone a rare start on the wing. Also, Nico Alexandre, who got a positive 20 minutes off the bench last week having signalled his return to fitness with a run-out for the Vikings, is among the four replacements.

Team:
Sam Stevernton, Tom Ceillam, Layton Batiste, Lewis Hillier, Nick Merrien, George Shannon, Matt Creber, Douglas Horrocks; Owen Clemett, Elia Morisio, Callum Gladstone, Blair Campbell, Luke Jones, Anthony Armstrong, Daley Aremu.
Replacements: Dave Anderson, Cameron Craine, Harry Baron, Nico Alexandre.