LYME Regis FC have parted company with their French manager Julien Simier. First team captain Robbie Fellingham has taken over temporarily until the end of the season with assistance from former Reserves' manager Luke Clifton.

Simier hails from Normandy where the Lyme club has a twinning arrangement with the village of Cruelly, playing against the Seasiders in the early years of the tie-up between the two clubs.

A very classy player in typical French style, Simier moved to Lyme and played for several seasons before the role of club coach and then the manager's job. 

The parting of the ways came after Lyme, who have lost a number of players in recent months, struggling to field two sides, lost 3-0 to Okehampton 2nds who were bottom of the Devon and Exeter Premier division, described as the 'shock result' of that weekend as Lyme were in third place. The previous week Okehampton had been beaten 11-0.

The decision to vacate the manager's role was by mutual agreement after a conversation with club chairman Gerard Hitchcock, himself a former player and manager.

Mr Hitchcock issued the following statement this afternoon: "I wish to thank Julie for his efforts and time. As a club we felt we need to change direction for the best interests of players and teams in terms of player retention and recruitment."

Lyme had the chance to redeem themselves last Saturday when they met Okehampton 2nds again at the Davey Davey Fort in the return fixture, wining 2-0 on this occasion to stay in fourth place in the table.

Okehampton are a very young and well discipline side and didn't look like a side that had been beaten 11-0. There was very little between the two side in the first half, although Lyme had the best scoring chances with Brad Rowe, Dan Beer and Mark Bailey all going close with good efforts.

Lyme keeper Chris Higgs was rarely troubled but kept the score at 0-0 at half time after a brave save diving at the feet of a visiting attacker.

The first goal came four minutes after the start when Steve Batey headed home from a pin-point Mark Bailey corner.

New signing Ethan Matthews went close with a shot that went just wide in the 50th minute and Robbie Fellingham completed the 2-0 scoreline in the 60th minute when he smashed the ball home from close range.

This was a much more focused performance from Lyme whose back four of AlexRowe, Dane Beer, Gary Knight and Josh Rawlins giving little away. Beer in particular, didn't put a foot wrong, winning all the aerial battles to win the man-of-the-match award.Writing in this week's match day programme. Fellingham paid tribute to Simier's contribution not the club over many years, describing him as a "legend on and off the field", adding "his commitment and drive will be impossible to replace".