Winchester City's director of football David Malone insists his FA Vase winners went about signing Fareham Town striker Jamie Musselwhite "in the right and proper manner."

Fareham manager Jon Gittens, the former Saints and Portsmouth defender, has accused City of "bad manners" for failing to contact him before snapping up the 28-goal former Hamble ASSC hitman on contract, writes WENDY GEE.

But Malone reckons Wessex League champions City can't do right for doing wrong with some clubs and that he had kept Fareham fully informed through their chairman Bob Ralls.

He said: "I left a message with the Fareham chairman to phone before meeting with Jamie Musselwhite the Sunday before last. We agreed a deal, but Jamie told me he'd already signed Wessex forms for Fareham for next season and I wanted to be 100 per cent sure that they were prepared to release him before he put pen to paper.

"On the Monday I still hadn't heard back from their chairman, so I rang him myself and he couldn't have been nicer. It even got to the point where I said that in three or four weeks we could be releasing some decent players and that Jon Gittens should contact me if he was interested in any of them.

"When I asked if I should ring Jon Gittens about Jamie, the chairman said he would deal with it."

Not long after news of Musselwhite's move had been broken in the Echo, Malone got a phone call from an unhappy Gittens complaining about City's tactics.

Malone said: "He claimed he knew nothing about it, but in these situations you can't do right for doing wrong. If you ring the manager, the chairman moans and if you ring the chairman, the manager moans. I fully understand Jon Gittens not being happy, but somewhere along the line we'll lose players in similar circumstances - and Fareham quite happily took Musselwhite from Hamble. That's what happens if you don't tie them up contractually."

The saga might not be over yet, however. As of yesterday, Musselwhite was still a registered Fareham player even though he has signed a contract for Winchester. Malone said: "Unless both clubs agree, you can't transfer a player between two Wessex clubs until the end of September. Technically Fareham could stop Jamie playing until then, but I don't know what that would achieve."