Gosport Borough’s FA Trophy semi-final hero Tim Sills assumed he’d had his last love affair with Wembley.

The 35-year-old veteran striker and PE teacher, left, has had three previous trips to the home of football and admits he thought those days were well behind him.

That was before the Hampshire club reached the Trophy final through his own vital goals in the semi and quarter-final. Sills scored second goal in Torquay’s 2-0 win in the Conference Premier play-off final against Gosport’s final opponents, Cambridge United, in 2009.

He said: “To actually score at Wembley and win there is something brilliant.

“It was just ridiculous. I would have happily retired then. To get the chance to go again at my age now is staggering.

“I came to Gosport and I hated football at that point after losing a lot of games at Bashley.

“Now I’m down to play at Wembley, it’s unbelievable really.”

Sills started the season at Southern Premier League strugglers Bashley, where he became disillusioned with football as they slumped to the foot of the table while embroiled in financial difficulties. But his move to the Conference South club has reinvigorated the journeyman’s career. He can’t help but think back to his third trip to Wembley, when he was left out of the Stevenage squad that beat York City 2-0 in the 2010 Trophy final. “I felt last time was going to be my last trip to Wembley. I wasn’t even in the squad then and it was a big shame to go out like that, I thought that was that,” he said. “To have my last memory before a game at Wembley being in the Bobby Moore Suite sipping wine probably wouldn’t have been a good one to end on. “At least this time I get a chance to go back and make sure it ends on a positive note, whatever that may be.”

More FA Trophy news in today's Daily Echo.