Cray Wanderers vs Brightlingsea Regent – Wednesday 19th October – The pre match thoughts/programme notes of Neil Smith

Cray Wanderers vs. Brightlingsea Regent, Isthmian Premier – Wednesday 19th October, 7.45 pm

The pre-game thoughts of Neil Smith

Pics: Jon Hilliger/Ozay Booth

 

Cray Wanderers return to action at Hayes Lane for the first time in close to a month this evening with the visit of Brightlingsea Regent.  Here Neil Smith looks back on Saturday’s draw at Potters Bar Town, his thoughts on the season so far and the FA Youth Cup experience for our Academy team.

 

Hello Neil.  It’s been quite a while since our last home home on 21st September and we’ve played the last five games away from home.  On Saturday we picked up a point at 2nd place Potters Bar Town.  What are your thoughts on the match and result.

I thought it was a worthy result and a good point against a side that is well up there and very good at what they do.  It was a good result but there are areas where I think we can improve. I thought Kellen Fisher on his debut and Ben Krauhaus were outstanding, two 18 year old kids who have come in on loan. They showed how badly they want to play for me and Tosh at Cray Wanderers.  I also thought the back four looked more solid.

Am I pleased with the result?  Yes as before the game I would have taken a draw but I still think there were more chances we could have had over the ninety minutes.

What have been your impressions of the first couple of months of the season.  So far, I would put it above par in the league.  

I feel we have shown in games like in the second half at Folkestone where we were outstanding what we can do but also in the cup at home to Bognor Regis Town we went from one extreme to another. It is all about getting that consistency.  We know we are a new team but you usually judge yourselves after ten games.  I think sitting where we are just outside the playoffs is probably good but we always want to improve.

We have shown some good resilience in games though haven’t we.  We were a goal down at Potters Bar as we were at Bishop’s Stortford, Folkestone and two behind against Bowers & Pitsea through a terrific far post volley but we got back into it with Danny Chapman’s goal.  He also saw a header tipped over the bar and Ben has had two good runs and shots on goal. 

That’s right and on another day Ben might have finished them but looking over the game overall I thought a draw was about right with no-one being really good enough to win the match but considering the run Potters Bar have been on we can be happy with a point.

Let’s have a look back to the FA Youth Cup run which saw the Cray Wanderers Academy/U18s side reach the 3rd Qualifying Round before losing to Kingstonian on Friday night.  You and Tosh were heavily involved with the side through the rounds.  Do you see the team in a year’s time being that much more experienced and even better players. The end result on Friday didn’t really do the team justice but they played well.

It wasn’t really a reflection on how well they have done.  We were missing certain players who could have made a difference. We have Michael Ihiedi who is just 15 as is Tom King in goal so they will be a year older.  The Kingstonian side were made up of mostly 18 year olds. 

It is one way of trying to bring the club together and one of the reasons I have come here is to help galvanise Cray Wanderers and the U18s mixing with the Academy side which is brand new.  As an experiment it went really well, we got through two great games against Dulwich Hamlet and Glebe. It also helped to bring players who do not know each other together.  So in terms of where we will be next year you hope a couple of them are knocking on your door and instead of going for Bromley U18s we might have a couple of our own. Kellen and Ben were two of my homegrown players when I was at Bromley bringing them through the youth system which is what I want to do here at Cray Wanderers.

Tonight we return to Hayes Lane for the visit of Brightlingsea Regent. It is important isn’t it to get our home form consistent as perhaps our performances away from home have been better than at home.

Yes, it has been really weird. We have a great surface and players that love playing on it and there is no need to be on edge. If I videoed the training sessions sometimes you wouldn’t recognise them from the team on the pitch. We are not asking them to do anything more than what they are good at. It is just about getting that belief, I know they can do it, we know the players have given their all since they’ve come here and we have just got to go again and we will get it right with belief.

Finally looking at the injury situation we were without Danny Bassett, David Ijaha and Freddie Carter for the Potters Bar game but with the exception of Harold Joseph are things looking better on the injury front overall.

Harold is going to be a good few months out.  Danny had a tweak in his hamstring before the game on Saturday but that gives someone else a chance to step up and Nyren Clunis came in after being out himself with injury.  David Ijaha was a big miss with his experience and how well he has played since coming to us and hopefully not too long out but whoever we put out we will give anyone a good game at the moment.

We will give Brightlingsea Regent plenty of respect this evening. Despite their league position they can make it hard for teams and as it showed when we played Bowers & Pitsea we showed them the respect and finished 3-3 and we started slow and had to come from 1-3 down. We can’t afford to drop points at home and it needs to be your fortress. I know we lost late against Hastings but I don’t think we have done ourselves justice at home so far in front of our supporters and I want them to see what we can do.