Worthing Raiders produced a superb display to beat National Two East leaders Old Albanian 38-20 at Roundstone Lane on Saturday.

Buoyed by their success at Bury St Edmunds, they saw Jonny Green, Zach Carr and Kieran Leeming return to the side and Jamie Ure make his first appearances since rejoining the club, having played as a youngster in 2015-16.

And a crowd of over 500 saw the visitors open the scoring in near perfect conditions with an unconverted try on eight minutes.

Worthing lost prop Fraser Bruce to a red card for a high tackle on 12 minutes, but they dug deep to deny OAs any addition to their total, before the visitors lost a player to serious injury.

Players returned to the dressing room as medics dealt with the issue, with Jackson Clark coming into the front row when play resumed as Carr dropped to the bench.

OAs added a second try from close range and Raiders went down to 13 men as scrum-half Cam Dobinson was yellow-carded.

Alex Davies came on as Fergus Guiry was temporarily sacrificed and the hosts scored three unanswered tries before the break despite their numerical inferiority.

Curtis Barnes broke on the left on the half-hour mark and, after the forwards had kept pushing, Barnes went over.

Then Harrison Sims collected the restart and offloaded to Tom Bowen, who ran in a stunning solo try which Sims converted for a 12-10 lead.

Bowen received a clearing kick soon after and raced away before linking up with his fellow backs for Jack Forrest to finish off in the corner and Worthing held firm after Jack Lake was sin-binned to take a seven-point lead into the break.

Powerful defence in midfield after the restart saw Raiders steal the ball for Barnes to score from 50 metres and put the 13 men 24-10 up.

Then, just before the hour mark, OAs received a yellow card, which left the sides at even strength and Raiders produced a couple of lineout catch and drive moves, before winning a scrum and seeing Frank Taggart pick up from the base to launch a move that ended with man of the match Barnes sprinting in.

Davies converted from the touchline before making way for Dobinson, as Tom Hatch replaced Elliott Luke in the front row.

But the visitors poured forward and scored two unconverted tries in the space of five minutes to make it 31-20, with another chance going begging as the final pass went foward.

Raiders continued to defend superbly in the closing stages and completed a memorable win when Bowen intercepted a pass and ran the length of the field to go under the posts, with Sims converting.

Victory leaves them in fourth place, just one point behind new leaders Blackheath, ahead of their trip to Guernsey on Saturday (1.30pm) as only three points separate the top six.

Worthing: Bruce, Luke, Sargent, Lake, Green, R Ure, Carr, Taggart, Dobinson, Leeming, Barnes, Sims, Forrest, Bowen, Guiry. Bench: Hatch, Clark, J Ure, Hoare, Davies.