Manager Steve Watt says his Hythe team are still getting to know each other.

With that in mind, the Cannons boss took great encouragement from their FA Cup First Qualifying Round tie against higher-league Hayes & Yeading.

The visitors, boasting the likes of Dan Wishart, Charlie Wassmer, Moses Emmanuel and Mo Bettamer, won 2-0 at Reachfields with a pair of late goals.

Watt had no complaints with the result against a team who reached last season’s Southern Premier play-off final.

But he could be happy in the main with what he saw from his new-look side as they continue to gel after a summer of change.

“I thought we dealt with their threats well, when you consider the team they have,” said Watt.

“We restricted them to not much. We’ve let in a sloppy first goal - if I’m honest I think it’s a free-kick to us but the ref misses it - and the second is from a turnover in the middle of the park.

“They came away knowing they’d been in a game.

"It’s a nice feeling to know we’ve given a team at their level, who just missed out in the play-off final last season to go into National South, a good game.

“We were unlucky not to go in front before they scored.

“It’s disappointing but if you’re going to go out, go out to a team at a higher level in the way we have where we’ve given it a good go.

“Their experience and quality was the difference in the end.

“There were aspects I wasn’t overly happy with but we’re still finding out about each other where it’s a new squad and we’ve not had many games together.

“But, looking at the game, if we play like that most weeks, we’ll beat the majority of teams in our league.

“I thought we caused problems, we asked questions and dealt with them quite well, but not well enough because we didn’t get the win.

“I’m never happy to lose a game but we can walk away with our heads held high.”

Hythe are due at Merstham in the FA Trophy First Qualifying Round on Saturday.

The Surrey club are bottom of Isthmian Southern Central - the equivalent level to Hythe - and are managed by ex-Carshalton boss Peter Adeniyi.

Watt is reading nothing into their league position.

“That’ll be a tough game,” he said. “They took Sevenoaks to a replay in the last round of the FA Cup.

“Pete’s very good at what he does, he did a brilliant job at Carshalton and no doubt he’ll do a great job at Merstham.

“We’ll have to play well to progress but we’ve played seven games so far this season and we’ve been in every one of them.

"Our last league game, at Ramsgate, was probably the best one of my sides has played in 45 minutes. We were rampant.

“We’ve got ourselves in front and it should have been four or five at half-time.

“Fair play to Ramsgate, they’ve changed shape at half-time and come out with more aggression about them.

“Two mistakes have cost us and we’ve ended up losing 2-1.

“There’s no shame in losing to Ramsgate, they’re a very good side, but we should have been out of sight.”