HAMPSHIRE coach Jimmy Cook is pinning his hopes on the side's two-day humbling by Sussex being "a blip" and not "a train crash" as they look to pick themselves up from the floor.

Cook was still trying to put a positive spin on Hampshire's first Cricinfo Championship Division Two defeat of the season to Sussex at Hove after being blasted out for 81 and 108 to lose by an innings and 13 runs.

He said: "We were very disappointed with the performance because we have made a point of being a hard side to beat this season.

"But you're also not going to play 16 perfect games in the championship.

"Every side will have a blip at some time and I would rather it all happened in one go in this match."

Certainly just about everything that could go wrong for Hampshire did go wrong as they ran into Jason Lewry who found conditions perfect for his brand of left-arm swing bowling.

Lewry took 6-37 as Hampshire were humiliated for just 81 first knock, and then bettered that with 7-42 second dig, including a hat-trick in the first over of the innings.

"When you lose three wickets in the first over of an innings, there's no way back from that," admitted Cook.

In addition to his hat-trick, Lewry took three wickets in 15 balls to reduce Hampshire to 42-8.

Shaun Udal and Chris Tremlett restored a modicum of battered pride when they more than doubled the score to 89, and then Udal and Alan Mullally staved of the embarrassment of being bowled out twice in the match for two-figure scores when they lurched the score to 108.

As Cook surveyed he wreckage, he said: "It was a bit of a train crash. Of our 20 wickets to fall, six were first-ball dismissals and one was to the second ball, and that probably tells you something."

But Cook is confident Hampshire can recover from the shock as Sussex overhauled them to go into second place behind Middlesex. "We've got a week before our next championship match and I think that will do us good.

"I know there's always something to be said for getting back on a bike as soon as you've fallen off, but it will give the boys a chance to get this out of their system as I'm sure we can do.

"We've been a pretty good side this season and I'm not unhappy with the way we've played. I didn't see anything in the Sussex match to make me change my mind and I'm pretty confident this was just a one-off."