MANAGER John Barton's gamble of playing Pat Lyons and David Foy paid off as Worcester City sneaked a last minute winner against Hastings United.

The St George's Lane boss admitted he had taken a chance on playing the duo, who were both short of match fitness, but their influence helped produce an impressive first-half performance.

New signings John Snape and Michael Blackwood also featured prominently while Barton's decision to play Darren Middleton up front in place of Mark Owen paid off when the former Aston Villa trainee grabbed the first goal in the 2-1 win.

Despite Hastings second half revival which was ended by Jon Holloway's 90th minute winner, Barton felt his side had deserved the victory and was pleased by his side's first half showing.

"We took a bit of a chance with team selection in playing Pat and David, who have not had a lot of football recently, but I think it paid off and we played some good stuff," he said.

"John Snape was outstanding for the first hour and Michael was a constant threat.

"I think we deserved to win over 90 minutes.

"There might be a tendency to look at what was a disappointing second half display where we didn't show the same control, but in the first half we had two or three good chances.

"From our point of view the pleasing thing was that that was as good as we have played in a long time.

"There are still things to improve upon but it was encouraging."

Barton also had words of comfort for Owen who had been surprisingly left out.

"Mark's made terrific progress since his return and done remarkably well but I think we have overplayed him a bit in pre season," he explained.

"There shouldn't be anything read into the fact he has been left out, it is purely for his benefit and hopefully we will soon be talking about him being among the goals again."

City face a long trip for their next match at Tiverton Town on Wednesday night but Barton is hoping to have all Saturday's squad to choose from including Blackwood who suffered a knock to his foot.