Dolby picks up his troops after Hampton & Richmond robbery

Tonbridge Angels’ manager Tony Dolby insists he will lift his troops in time for Monday night’s Kent Senior Cup clash with Ramsgate, writes Stephen McCartney.

Their Ryman Premier League play-off dreams were dashed following Hampton & Richmond Borough’s controversial 3-1 win at the Betterview Longmead Stadium yesterday.

ALL THREE of Hampton & Richmond Borough’s goals were scored in controversial circumstances, robbing the Angels of vital points in their quest to reach the end of season play-off lottery.

The Essex based match officials, Messrs West, Goddard and Wood were grilled by their assessor for at least an hour in the sanctuary of their dressing room after the game.

“We can take a lot of heart from our performances, certainly in the last six games,” a disillusioned Dolby told www.kentishfootball.co.uk after yesterday’s theft.

“Although the results suggest a little bit of inconsistency, I think on the contrary we’ve actually played very well in the majority of the games.

“When we were losing before, we were actually losing and deserving to lose but we’ve won our last two and when we’ve lost against Heybridge and against Hampton, we’ve deserved to get something out of both games.”

Dolby is expected to hand reserve team goalkeeper Matt Bromby his second start of the season against the Rams on Monday night.

The former Tunbridge Wells, Hastings United and Maidstone United goalkeeper played in the Angels’ 7-3 win over a young Gravesend & Northfleet side in the first round back in November.

But Dolby insists his players will be focused on reaching the semi-finals of the county cup competition.

“I’ve obviously got a job to do (to) pick the lads up,” he said. “We’ve got a quarter-final of the Kent Cup on Monday night against Ramsgate.

“A big opportunity to get straight back there and get straight back on with the job again but we certainly aren’t going to look at (the Hampton defeat) too much.

“We’re just going to crack on with it and keep trying to put in the consistent performances that we have done.

“It’s the quarter-finals of the cup, we shouldn’t need any picking up but like I’ve said we’ve got some good performances under our belt lately so we can take heart from that and hopefully get a result on Monday night and we’ll get back on track again.”

Dolby described his feelings after yesterday’s smash-and-grab raid by a Hampton & Richmond Borough side that’s no more than workmanlike.

He said: “Absolutely gutted. It hasn’t quite sank in that we’ve come away with nothing out of today’s game - similar to the Heybridge game.

“I’ve got the weekend to analyse it and Monday night back to work.

“I don’t like to blame officials or anything like that, they seem genuine enough guys and all three goals they were big decisions and ones that I felt didn’t quite go in our favour.

“The third goal, the throw-in that he gave, clearly came off their player and they scored straight from it and that was the icing on the cake.”

He added: “We’ve got to look at ourselves. We’ve had enough chances to win the game today, therefore we’ve got to look at our finishing as well so I’m not going to heap all the blame on the officials.”

Steve Aris, Tonbridge’s central defender and skipper, was amazed by the decisions made by the match officials.

“A bit disappointed result wise (but) performance wise we all thought we all done enough, or more than enough really - we had numerous chances,” he told www.kentishfootball.co.uk after the game.

“We’d like to blame officials for some silly refereeing and linesman decisions have cost us today we all feel and we are all hugely, hugely disappointed.”

Tonbridge striker Jon Main scored his 37^th goal of the season with an exquisite lob from the edge of the penalty area after 24 minutes.

But Elliott Godfrey was YARDS offside before he was brought down by Angels’ goalkeeper Aaron Kerr before stepping up to score the 33^rd minute penalty himself.

After Tonbridge twice hit the woodwork in the space of three second half minutes through Aris and Main, Hampton & Richmond Borough added salt into Angels’ wounds with two goals in the last eight minutes.

Glen Harris’ 82^nd minute strike gave the visitors the lead after Kerr picked up Matt Lovell’s back pass after the Kent side sportingly allowed the ball to run out of play to allow one of the Hampton players to receive treatment.

And to add insult to injury the ball clearly struck a Hampton player before crossing the touchline - only for Hampton to go on and score seconds later when Lawrence Yaku scored his 12^th goal of the season with a lob that went in via the top of the far post in the 90^th minute.

Tonbridge assistant manager Mike Rutherford can expect a three match ban and a fine after being sent off after putting his point across following the officials’ THIRD COSTLY BLUNDER.

“That’s where it started from, the first one,” bemoaned Aris. “We feel the second one and the third it’s all come down to the decisions of referees.

“But football’s about football and we’ve got to have a referee (and) they make the decisions but we have to get on and deal with it, although we were all disappointed, the first one was the worst of the lot and it just went on from there.”

Aris, meanwhile, wants to get his hands on some silverware this season.

“It’s a welcomed distraction,” he said. “Being on a Monday night is a bit of a killer but we’re in the quarter-final (so) we’re in it to win it.”

Meanwhile, Ramsgate jumped into seventh place in the Ryman Premier League table following their 2-0 win over Harrow Borough at Southwood Stadium.

Visit club websites:

www.tonbridgeangels.co.uk  &  www.tonbridgeafc.co.uk/forum

www.ramsgate-fc.co.uk

Tonbridge Angels v Ramsgate
Kent Senior Cup Quarter-Final
Monday 19^th March 2007
Kick Off 7:45pm
At Betterview Longmead Stadium, Darenth Avenue, Tonbridge, Kent TN10 3JF