Having taken the opportunity in recent friendlies to evaluate some players from outside the club, Neville Southall turned his focus towards the club's reserve team players in this friendly at Herne Bay on Tuesday evening. There was only one triallist on show, 20-year-old QPR midfielder Justin Cochrane. The Whites defence consisted entirely of young reserve players, with Adam Govey, Dean Hill and Craig Cloke making up the back three. On the bench were three other reserve/youth players, goalkeeper Tim Austin, forward Michael Smissen and winger Kelvin Davies. Midfielder Neil Le Bihan was making his first first team outing in a month having successfully completed 90 minutes for the Reserves on Saturday whilst recently recovered Matt Carruthers switched to a central striking role alongside Scott Ramsay.

Dover dominated from the first whistle with Le Bihan, Carruthers and Tony Browne orchestrating the attacking play. It took just seven minutes to open the scoring, Le Bihan converting a spot-kick after Ramsay was brought down in the box.

The home side had a penalty of their own after 22 minutes but it was hit well over the bar and the score remained 0-1 until the 38th minute when Dover doubled their advantage. A Dover corner was played deep to Jamie Day outside the area and he hit a wicked swerving shot from 30-yards that the Herne Bay keeper did well to parry but Craig Cloke was first to react and slotted the loose ball into the back of the net.

It was 0-2 at the start of the second half but Dover ripped through the Herne Bay defence and hit four goals in the space of nine minutes to make it 0-6 by the hour mark. Matt Carruthers sparked the goal flurry on 51 minutes when he found the bottom corner from a 25-yard free-kick. Two minutes later Carruthers scored again finishing coolly with just the keeper to beat. On 56 minutes Darren Davies made it five with a brilliant back post diving header and there was just time for Tim Austin to replace Paul Hyde in the Dover goal before Carruthers completed his hat-trick in the 60th minute with a header.

At this point Carruthers made way for young Michael Smissen, then Govey was replaced by Kelvin Davies as Tony Browne slotted into the back three. The loss of Carruthers and Browne from the attacking play blunted Dover's threat, though Le Bihan was outstanding throughout.

Paul Hyde re-emerged as a forward, replacing Scott Ramsay for the final 13 minutes and though Athletic attempted to engineer a goal for him the only addition to the scoreline was the obligatory consolation goal for the hosts, coming four minutes from time.

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