That was the conviction of team co-manager Bob Bantock after they beat Staffordshire 3-0 in the final at Birmingham City's St Andrew's stadium this week. The previous season, they had defeated Northumberland in the final at Stoke City FC.

He said: "We went about it professionally and when you do that, it goes a long way. Staffordshire had only a short journey to the ground for the match, so they came on the day, but we came up here the night before. We stayed at the National Sports Centre at Lilleshall, which was where the England 1966 World Cup prepared. This meant we had the proper food and had somewhere to train and work on set-pieces the next morning, before the match.

"That all got us focused. Then when we got to the stadium, we were in the away dressing room. So all I needed to do was remind the boys that they were sitting in the same room as people like Giggsy, Ronaldo and Van der Sar when they there came to play Birmingham City. I didn't need to do anything more than mention that. The effect was psychological."

Bantock and fellow schoolteacher Ian Hutchings are the team bosses of undisputably the country's No 1 county schools team - and not only of Sussex but Worthing FC's successful youth side, who won the Isthmian League Youth Cup last season and reached the semi-finals this.

Marcus Whiteman (Hailsham Community College) opened the scoring in the first half, Worthing's Youth team captain last season, Mickey Demetriou (Chichester Tech), got the second after half-time and Jack Dixon (William Parker, Hastings) added the icing on the cake. Staffordshire had scored nine goals in their semi-final.

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