Eastbourne Borough's already worrying injury list lengthened as they crashed at home to a physical Worcester City side.
Stewart Holmes and Dave Adams went off with damaged ankles and both are out of Tuesday night's League Cup match at Welling.
Borough boss Garry Wilson accepted that Worcester were just too strong for his depleted troops. He said: "It is hard to criticise my players. They gave it their all and I cannot ask for more than that.
"Worcester were a good, solid team with experienced Southern League players in abundance. They were up for it and when we lost another two players it meant juggling things around again," he said.
Borough fell behind in the 18th minute when a short corner found Allan Davies and his low drive was deflected into the net by Adam Webster.
Three minutes into the second half Leon Kelly made it 2-0, but within a minute Scott Ramsay had put Borough back into the game.
The equaliser would not come and Paul Carty sealed the game for City in the 85th minute.
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