Jimmy Quinn has challenged his Lewes players to bounce back from their FA Vase exit.

The Rooks turned in a below-par display as they crashed out at home to AFC Sudbury.

Now Quinn wants to salvage something from the season by winning the Ryman League division two title.

To back up that bid, Quinn announced after the game he had signed Danny Fletcher from St Leonards and was in talks with Worthing's former Albion midfielder Danny Davis in a bid to bolster his injury-ravaged squad.

Quinn said: "I have got to pick the players up but I won't be picking some again if I have the option.

"I demand 100 per cent every game they play in. I can accept people playing badly but I can't accept people not giving 100 per cent.

"People keep telling me the league is not important but how do they work that out? You can judge a team on how they perform over the season and we want to win that league.

"We said at the start of the season we want to do as well as we can in that league. At the moment we are up at the top and we are trying to hang in there.

"Anybody who thinks winning the league is not important, well you tell that to my players who have got broken legs and the like.

"We have always been chasing the league title. If we had won today, we would still have been chasing it. Whether we win it or not is another thing but we are chasing it."

If anyone is looking for reasons for this defeat against Eastern Counties League leaders Sudbury, they should look no further that the long list of players missing for the Rooks.

The biggest blow was Justin Harris breaking a leg two weeks ago. He was one of ten players missing for the Rooks and one of five midfielders.

The situation was so bad that Lewes included three players who had not played for the club before and could only name four substitutes.

St Leonards skipper Liam Barham was handed a debut in midfield after signing on loan but his interest lasted just 66 minutes before he was shown the red card for an alleged elbow on Sudbury substitute Lee Owen.

To be fair, the sending off had little to do with the outcome. Lewes were second best from the first whistle and rarely threatened to break down a Sudbury side who had promised more than they delivered.

Quinn said: "I am bitterly disappointed in our performance. The players were shown up for what they were. They think they are better than they are and they were shown up.

"Good luck to Sudbury, they have beaten us fair and square. There were dreadful mistakes for the two goals. If we learn from them, that will be one good thing to come out of it."

A crowd of 1,520 packed into the Dripping Pan but the signs were not good from the start as Lewes looked nervous and made a series of unforced errors.

A heavily sanded pitch did not help matters but Sudbury tried to get their passing going and were duly rewarded with a goal in the 15th minute.

Impressive frontman Sam Banya swapped passes with Terry Rayner before crossing low for Paul Betson to tap home unchallenged at the far post.

Quinn made a change at half time, throwing on Matt Beeston for the ineffective Chris Dicker and pushing the lively Lee Newman further forward to support lone striker Sam Francis.

For a while there was more urgency about Lewes but their plans were undone by Barham's dismissal.

When Sudbury scored a second with 11 minutes remaining, the contest was effectively over.

Paul Thomsett's back header from just inside his own half never had enough power. Ross Standen's hesitancy in coming for it did not help and Banya ran clear, then steadied himself before setting up Gary Bennett for a simple finish.

Lewes pulled a goal back in stoppage time when Banya felled Marc Cable for a penalty which Newman converted but it was too little, too late from the hosts.

Defeat was hard to take for Lewes but chairman Terry Parris insists a bright future lies ahead for the club.

Parris said: "We have got a taste for this now and we want to keep it going.

"There is a great future for the club. We have put a lot of things in place on and off the pitch. We have got a good squad of players which we are keeping together. We just want to keep this squad atmosphere and the atmosphere behind the scenes going.

"We have teams coming through, a lot of good boys, and it is the future of the club.

"In a couple of years when the restructuring takes place, we want to be strongly placed with a good squad, a good management and a good team behind the scenes. That is our plan. We have come a long way and now we are very close."