LEAMINGTON suffered a disappointing exit at the Second Round Qualifying stage of the FA Cup after they slipped to a 1-0 defeat against Warwickshire rivals Nuneaton Borough.
The Brakes play one league above Nuneaton but were upset by the Southern League Premier Central side as Tyrell Waite scored the only goal on 81 minutes at the Your Co-op Community Stadium.
Former Leamington players Tony Breeden and Joe Magunda returned to the club for the first time, having made a combined total of 610 appearances for the Brakes.
Chances were few and far between in the first half as Den Meredith saw a 20-yard effort comfortably saved before Simeon Maye fired wide.
Brakes defender Theo Streete went closest to breaking the deadlock when his powerful header towards the bottom left corner was superbly kept out by Breeden before the flag was raised for offside.
And after Nuneaton were unable to make the most of a scramble inside the Leamington box, Jack Lane thumped a header against the crossbar at the other end.
The teams were evenly matched for much of the second period as Dan Turner fired narrowly over the bar before Callum Hawkins made an important stop at the other end to deny Matt Stenson.
However, Nuneaton finally opened the scoring with nine minutes left to play as Waite produced a cool finish past Hawkins from Kane Richards’s pass.
And Borough should have put the game to bed just a minute later when they were awarded a penalty only for Hawkins to make fine stop, diving to his right, to keep out Stenson’s spot kick.
Despite five minutes of added time, Paul Holleran’s side were unable to find a leveller to crash out of the FA Cup against their local rivals.
Holleran said: “There was no quality in the game from either side, and then it’s us being sloppy; giving the ball away high up and not reacting. That let the boy in and it was a good finish.
“It was a disappointing day for us. We’ll have to work hard with a busy week ahead of us against Southport and Hereford, so we’ll regroup.”
Leamington are next in action away at Southport on Saturday, September 24 with kick-off at 3pm at Haig Avenue.
