“Good evening and a warm welcome to everyone – including tonight’s opponents Tooting and Mitcham United FC.

Where do we start? As they say, a week is a long time in football and I think the past 7 days have highlighted that in its entirety.

Last Tuesday, as a coach, as a fan, and as a player was an experience we will NOT experience again. To lose giving your best is just acceptable, losing without any desire or effort is very disappointing. I don’t feel there’s any need to harp on about the performance, but just to say as a group we let our manager, and our families down. 

Move on 24 hours and the whole dynamic changes. Chappers decided he needed a break. Knowing Chappers well, his desire, his commitment, and attitude towards the club, I totally understand his mindset. When you give EVERYTHING to a club like Chappers has done for the past 7 years, the least you expect is players to put in a shift. 

That’s a given, the minimum, what’s expected every time they step over the white line, whether it be with Burgess Hill or any other club. Unfortunately that didn’t happen.

On Thursday, we sat down as a group and discussed moving forward. There was an open forum for players to get issues of their chest, for young players to have a voice, for backroom staff to have an input, and for myself as coach to set out EXACTLY how we were going to move this club forward.

And what a response! We travel to Bishops Stortford, top of the form table, without a win under our belt. We had prepared ourselves Thursday, we knew the shape, players knew their roles, what was expected, and to a man everyone was outstanding. In the coming weeks you will hear me say about giving the players responsibility, ownership over their performance, being accountable for certain jobs. My job is to guide them and give them the necessary tools to go and win matches. Winning matches is a process which comes from standards of performance, we got that right on Saturday in every position and dominated our opponents, but for some very strange refereeing decisions we would have won the game, which is what the players totally deserved. Myself and John were very proud of them.

Now we have a platform to work from, it’s now down to the players to show you the fans, and their families what they’re about, to enjoy their football, to appreciate your support and to deliver a performance of high energy every time we play.”

I hope you enjoy the game.

Worms