Sutton United head coach Ian Baird declared himself content after Saturday's FA Trophy third round stalemate.

United could not capitalise on first-half chances for Craig Dundas and Ross Stearn and, with strong winds making life difficult for attack and defence alike, almost exited the competition in the last 10 minutes, as Alfie Rutherford and Gavin Davies went close for Bognor Regis late on.

Following the 0-0 draw, the two sides will go head to head again tomorrow night on the south coast for a place in the last eight.

“I think both sides, attacking-wise, huffed and puffed and couldn’t blow the house down,” Baird said.

“On the day, the conditions won. There wasn’t a lot of good football going on because of the conditions.

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"We had the best chance of the game, no doubt about that. We live to fight another day."

He added: “We found it very, very difficult to get it out of our half [in the second half] and that was due to the conditions and also due to the point that we couldn’t look after the ball and it kept on popping back at us.

"But, credit where credit’s due to our defensive side of the game, I thought we did very well."

United were almost dumped out five minutes from time, when Rutherford chased a long ball over the top which Sutton goalie Ross Worner tried to clear on the edge of his box.

He could only smash the ball into Rutherford and the ball rebounded towards goal, bouncing narrowly wide as the home support held its breath.

“It was a strange one,” Baird said. “It’s a ball going through and normally it runs through but it seemed to hold up.

"Fortunately, Ross Worner got there, but didn’t get enough on it, it’s one of them that it could’ve gone in but fortunately enough it didn’t.

"I was expecting him to kick the ball as far away as he could.”