Fisher 6-0 Welling Town - We need to get to a Cup final, that's the aspirations we have as a management team and as a team as a whole, says Fisher assistant manager Jordan Darwish

Fisher 6 – 0 Welling Town
Location	St Paul's Stadium, Salter Road, Rotherhithe, London SE16 6NT
Kickoff	28/10/2025 19:45

FISHER  6-0  WELLING TOWN
Presence & Co Southern Counties East Football League Challenge Cup Second Round
Tuesday 28 October 2025
Stephen McCartney reports from St Paul’s Stadium

FISHER joint-assistant manager Jordan Darwish says he is keen to bring silverware to the club after emphatically booking their place in the last 16 of the Southern Counties East Football League Challenge Cup by thrashing poor First Division opposition.

Fisher – who were without their manager Ajay Ashanike who was in Egypt on holiday – raced into a two-goal lead inside the opening 20 minutes, courtesy of two tap-ins for striker Jake Lovell.

Welling Town capitulated during the second half, as winger Omari Williams scored a third goal before Boots’ holding midfielder Harry Beech scored an own goal before former Millwall midfielder Sha’mar Lawson, 22, came off the bench to score twice inside the final 21 minutes.

Fisher made five changes from the side that claimed a 1-0 win in Hextable at the weekend, a result that put them in eleventh-place in the Southern Counties East Football League Premier Division table with 19 points (five wins, four draws and three defeats) from their 12 league games.

Welling Town have extended their winless run to eight games and now haven’t scored in their last three games and lie in the bottom five of the First Division table, having picked up seven points (two wins, one draw and eight defeats), having conceded six goals for the ninth time in their history.

“It was a really good performance,” said Darwish, 24, who was in charge of the side alongside Michael Williams.

“I think these games are always the hardest ones when you’re playing against a team in the division below because this is their cup final really and for our boys it's about getting them up for it.

“I thought they handled the game really well. They controlled it from minute one and we took our chances, so yes, it was good, minutes in the legs really.

“We kept a core starting from Saturday and we were also able to give other players some minutes and I thought those boys played really, really well and took their opportunity. It just shows how strong our squad is.

“We’ve gone through a rough patch recently but it seems now we’re getting out of that and we’re trying to hit form at the right time.

“We controlled the game from minute zero to the 90^th minute. There was no bit where I thought we were in doubt of it as we didn’t really give Welling a sniff, so I was really pleased with that.”

Welling Town manager Kevin Oakes admitted: “Difficult night. I think without sounding defeatist I think we knew it was going to be a difficult night before we got here.

“We asked the boys, we’re in a bit of a transition period at the moment, but I asked the boys to give us 100% commitment and effort against a side that are at a higher level.  Obviously, certain bits I’m not happy about, the scoreline and some of the manner of those goals going in but generally speaking in terms of commitment and giving 100% are more important to me moving forwards for the rest of the season with important league games coming up.

“As much as it’s difficult to take any positives, generally speaking there’s a couple of bits that we did do what we asked them to do and they did do, so a little bit of credit.”

Fisher dominated this entire Second Round tie. Referee Kennedy Kikulwe didn’t even play the entire 90 minutes, ending the first half 16 seconds early and only playing five seconds of second half stoppage time but the game was effectively over after 20 minutes.

Dominant Fisher went close to scoring from their first of five corners, swung in by Lovell from the right, which was missed at the near-post by Welling Town’s left-back Kevel Sesay-Ince and Fisher centre-half Ange Djadja steered his header across the keeper and just past the far post after only 201 seconds.

Welling Town created only two goalscoring chances, their first coming from a 30-yard free-kick from central midfielder Harry Mark, which comfortably bounced into the gloves of untroubled Fisher goalkeeper Isaac Ogunseri (4:29).

“Harry’s got a really, really special left foot. His delivery from set-pieces has been really, really good and consistent all season and the tames he played for us last year,” said Oakes.

“We’re quite a small side at the moment, which makes it difficult to exploit the delivery that he’s capable of. 

“Yes, I think we’re scrapping at chances this evening in general, aren’t we? I don’t think there was a genuine goalscoring opportunity.”

Fisher opened the floodgates by taking the lead with nine minutes and 28 seconds on the clock.

High left-back Kelvin Bakare dominated Welling Town right-back Glen Bain during the first half and reached the channel to put over a cross, which was palmed away by the 16-year-old goalkeeper Zak Howard.

Flavio Jumo cut inside and recycled the ball back into the penalty area for striker Lovell to tap the ball into the bottom left-hand corner from a couple of yards.

“Kelvin is naturally a winger. We knew he would have a lot of possession with the ball today, so we said with Omari, if we can just invert a little bit and get Kelvin as high as possible, so he can do naturally what he would do on the wing and just defensively drop back into the left-back role,” explained Darwish.

“With Jake, he’s never been a stats player for us last season. He does all the basic fundamentals for us well but he never really gets goals and assists so for him to pop up with two goals, it just shows his worth with stats now.”

Oaks added: “Probably summed up the evening that goal and certainly the second one as well. Too many balls into our box that weren’t cut out at source, too many first contacts for Fisher.

“We didn’t have a centre-half on the pitch. We’ve got full-backs at centre-half and then we’ve got midfielders at full-back, so you accept maybe that you’re not going to be as aerially dominant but certainly the first and second goal there’s people in yards of space in our penalty area, which whether you’re a centre-half or not, I think that’s difficult to justify.

“We need to make Fisher and other sides work harder to score their goals. I think some of the goals tonight we’re a bit soft.”
 
Welling Town’s best chance of the night came (11:05) when Mark swept a fine left-footed pass from within the centre-circle in behind recalled Fisher centre-half Adejola Lahan to put in 17-year-old left-winger Leo Onye.

However, his left-footed drilled shot from 10-yards forced Ogunseri to swiftly get down low to his left and stick out his arm to pull off a vital save.

Oaks said: “We’ve got a lot of pace in the side. I don’t think we looked after the ball as we could’ve in the first half. We didn’t seem to secure the ball in the final third, I think some of that is physicality.

“But we’ve got some technical players and we’re certainly got some pace in attacking areas as well. It’s a bit of a half-chance. When we play the so-called weaker sides and games back at Step Six, we can be a threat in behind hen the delivery is good.”

Darwish added: “I think that’s probably the save of the game from both teams, reason being is when you’re a goalkeeper, if you have a lot of stuff to do, it’s easy. When you don’t have a lot to do in these types of games and you’re standing there and on a midweek fixture, you can get quite static and cold.

“To pull off a save like that, I think that just shows the quality of Isaac. He’s such a young player. It just shows the levels that he can go to.”

Fisher were a threat down each flank, with Welling Town’s full-backs Sesay-Ince and Bain completely outclassed, as Welling Town couldn’t cope with Fisher’s high-tempo and hungry performance.

Lovell laid the ball back for the impressive Tom Jones, who drilled a first time drive across the keeper and flashing just past the foot of the far post from 25-yards.

Fisher doubled their lead with 19 minutes and 2 seconds on the clock, with Bakare being the architect again.

Bakare delivered a deep cross from within the left channel, which sailed over David Mata’s head at the far post and the winger retrieved the ball from the right channel before cutting the ball back to right-back Michael Sarpong.

Sarpong’s deep cross was knocked down at the back post by left-winger Omari Williams and Lovell tapped the ball over the line at the far post from two yards to score his third goal of the season.

“Again, it was just about getting as many bodies forward as we could and dictating the tempo and if you play the right pass and there’s enough bodies forward it will drop to someone and that’s what happened,” said Darwish.

“A lot of our goals this season, we’ve had to work hard for and they’ve had to be stunners, so I think the football we’ve showed today and even on Saturday was the best we’ve played all season, so it’s nice to see we’re finally getting a bit of fluency going through each other now.”

Oakes added: “There you go, sometimes you play a side at a higher level and they smash one in from 30-yards or they put 20 passes together and they open you up and you have to be honest enough to say ‘do you know what, good goal, well played.’

“But the second one sums up what I said a moment ago, a cross into the box. I think it should’ve been dealt with a bit better, free header back across goal and then just an easy tap in.

“That’s three situations there that could’ve been addressed with. It’s not one mistake, it’s three mistakes and if you give good sides at a higher level opportunities like that and you make mistakes in your defensive third, three times in 10 seconds, don’t be surprised when you’re putting the ball out of the goal.”

Lovell tried to score from just inside the left corner of the Welling Town penalty area – after Bakare’s throw-in – but the ball rolled into the gloves of the untroubled Howard.

Fisher holding midfielder Tyron Mbuenimo, who was pulling the strings as Welling’s attacked failed to press the Fisher defensive players, sprayed the ball out to the high Bakare, who cut onto his right foot and put in another cross for Jumo to head down and straight into Howard’s gloves for a comfortable 29^th minute save.

“We opened them up, we’re finding spare men. There’s enough bodies forward to overload them and the ball will drop if you’re there between the goal posts, something will drop for you,” added Darwish.

Dominant Fisher kept knocking on the door and Sarpong’s deep cross from the right was knocked down at the far post and fell to Williams, who cracked a right-footed volley, which was beaten away by Howard, who made seven saves tonight.

“He’s 16, great prospect. I went out for the second half, even the Fisher photographer was saying ‘what’s the average age of your side?’  We’ve literally got one in his 30s and I think one is 24 or 25 and everybody else is 21 on under, including two who are still at school, Leo Onye is only just 17 and the goalkeeper is 16,” revealed Oakes.

“To even be playing non-league pyramid football at 16 speaks volumes. He’s got a bright future so have both of them.

“Zak was in the Merstham FA Youth Cup side that played Chelsea last season and we’re very lucky to have them.

“But naturally if you’ve got 16-17 year olds in your side, they are going to come with less physicality than a 30 year old man. They are going to come with less experience and maybe a little bit less communication because they haven’t been there and seen it and done it and that’s not mean as criticisms.  We don’t expect 16, 17 year olds to be perfect rounded expert Step Five, Step Six footballers but we’re really, really pleased to have both of them at the club and they’ve got bright futures.”

Fisher were to be denied a third goal (44:06) when the five-goal Jones curled his right-footed free-kick onto the left-hand post from 28-yards.

“With Tom today, he could’ve had a hat-trick on another day. I thought he was superb,” hailed Darwish.

“He ran the show, especially in the first half. I thought he ran the midfield so for him not to get that goal with that free-kick, it’s just like a gust of wind just blows it away and it hits the post and Omari’s there for the tap in and he misses the follow up. It’s like one of those days with that chance there.”

Both were asked their thoughts at the interval.

Darwish said: “We just said we’re really on top. We’re controlling the game, keep doing what you’re doing, don’t drop off the gas. You’ve got to go up another level now because they’re going to come out even harder and I think the boys showed that in the second half.”

Oakes added: “More of the same really. Whilst we didn’t threaten the Fisher goal, I think we looked an awful lot better off the ball. We looked like we were showing a greater desire and energy and all of the things that are non- negotiable in my book.

“We did better than we did (in our 2-0 home defeat to bottom side) Chessington on Saturday for example.

“It’s so difficult to take positives, no one likes to get beat, no one likes to get beat comfortably like it was tonight and Fisher to their credit were good and thoroughly deserving of their win.

“But we sort of said ‘look, you can do it’ and you’ve got to take this level of performance and commitment and desire into the games that we’ve got coming up.”

Fisher set the tone of the second half after only 18 seconds when Jones played the ball up to Lovell, who hooked the ball over to winger Mata, who cut onto his right-foot and drilled his shot over the crossbar.

Fisher scored their third goal of the night with seven minutes and 45 seconds on the clock when Jumo put the ball in from the right channel into the box where Williams brought the ball under his spell and took several touches inside the box before burying his low shot past Howard, who was given no protection from his makeshift and woeful back four (Tejan Heywood and Luke Hearn at centre-back) and right-winger Jordan Samuel failed to turn up and offered nothing at all.

“Very good, just bodies forward, moving the ball correctly. We opened them up and then we finished our chances, very clinical,” added Darwish, who was pleased with his side’s professional performance against limited opposition.

“These games are the hardest to get up for because subconsciously as a player, you think they’re a league below, it’s going to be an easy day so to get up and do the hard work is to win the second balls, running off the ball, that’s the hardest bit about these teams and we done it to a tee and we got our rewards from it and our quality showed.”

Oakes added: “Similar to the commits to the other goals, crosses. You’ve used the word crosses multiple times (during our interview).

“I put that down to the fact that our backline today, every single one of them was under 21 and every single one of them is not a centre-half, so to a degree it’s expect and frankly we do need to go shopping in that area.

“I’m not going to criticise young men that have given me everything and being asked to play out of position. I’m not going to criticise them for not lacking any more if you ask your goalkeeper to play up front or your left-winger to play in goal.  You wouldn’t be criticising them, you’d be thanking them for doing what the team needs.”

Fisher were given a helping hand for their fourth goal of the night, that arrived just 69 seconds later.

Poplar resident Jones found himself in the right channel – a common theme of Fisher’s players reaching the channel as Welling Town’s full backs were not very good – and his cut back was turned into his own goal by Beech at the near-post inside the six-yard box.

“It’s just about getting the bodies in the right areas, crossing it into the box and it will happen. As long as you get enough bodies in the box something will fall to something and something will happen usually,” added Darwish.

Oakes added: “Harry’s been exceptional. He does a lot of the un-noticed things off the ball. He’s a good link-up man between midfield and our front three when we’re attacking but he does the selfish un-noticed things off the ball. He’s not a big physical presence. He’s not particularly quick. He’s just got this knack of being in the right place at the right time in defensive area and I think it’s one of those, you really really want to praise him for.

“That’s one of our centre midfielders carrying a knock that’s in his own six-yard box, full credit for being there. If he’s not there, it goes in anyway, so no criticism on his shoulders for turning (that into his own goal).

“There’s plenty of times this season already that he’s been in those sort of areas and denied the opposition goals, just a bit unlucky on that occasion – but I thought he had a decent game.”

Fisher brought on Lawson, who played for Millwall’s under 21s and spent loan periods at the likes of Maidstone United, Ebbsfleet United and Woking and made five appearances for Ben Smith’s Isthmian Premier Division Ramsgate in August.

The midfielder made an instant impact. Jumo, Williams, Bakare all linked up before Lawson stroked a low right-footed drive from 25-yards, which Howard smothered low to his left for a comfortable save.

“We’ve had Sha’mar for about two weeks now and I’ve been able to get on with him really well,” said Darwish.

“He’s a lovely kid, is coachable and his ability is levels above this standard (ninth-tier) and he knows that.

“So when he came on it’s about you have to impact the game. There has to be a goal or an assist coming and he comes on and he gets two goals and he impacts the game.

“I think every single game he steps on to the pitch at this standard he has to impact it because that’s what his ability demands.”

When asked whether Lawson harbours ambitions to play at the level of football that he should be playing at, Darwish replied, “This is just for him to get back into the game, enjoy his football again and put other teams on notice. Like, his name holds a lot of weight in the football world and once people see that he is getting his minutes back into his legs and he is doing the dirty work there will be big teams coming for him as soon as possible.”

Fisher went close from their penultimate corner.  Sarpong swung the corner in from the right and Lawson’s hooked shot flashed across the keeper and just past the far post in the 63^rd minute.

Howard pulled off an outstanding double save to deny substitute striker Marko Jovanovic and Mata – stretching high to his left to claw out the rebound – but his luck ran out when Lawson knocked the ball over the line as Fisher scored their fifth goal of the night with 23 minutes and 11 seconds on the clock.

“It’s just the story of the game, bodies forward, put it in the right area and it just drops to someone.”

When asked about Howard’s performance, Darwish added: “Brilliant! I thought the keeper actually had a good game. The scoreline doesn’t tell the story for him. He had a good game. He seemed like a young keeper and it’s hard when you’ve got a barrage of chances coming against you but he held up well for them. He couldn’t do much about a lot of the goals.”

Oakes added: “I think there’s a bit of misfortune with that one. He’s made a great save and it could go anywhere and sods law when you’re down on your luck it drops to one of their players and then he’s off balance for the second one and although he’s got a hand to it, which in itself is brilliant to get a hand to it, he’s off balance and he can’t get enough strength on it to keep it out of the goal.

“There’s a theme developing here that the goals are tap-ins from what two-yards?”

Jovanovic played a low pass into Mata, who cut inside before dragging a low drive just past the left-hand post from the edge of the D.

A poor Welling Town outfit didn’t look like scoring in the second half and face a battle to avoid relegation back into the Kent County League.

Howard was beaten for a sixth time, the clock showing 43 minutes and 15 seconds, when substitute holding midfielder Conor Darwish swung in their fifth corner in from the right and no one picked up Lawson, who buried his header into the back of the net.

“It’s one of those ones, no one was picking him up. It was a free header.  You just get it on target and it drops in. A good delivery from Conor as well,” added Darwish, who was pleased with another clean sheet.

“That’s two in two now and we’ve got to build on that.  Last season, defensively we were emphatic and it needs to keep those standards.

“I think the start of the season has been a bit up and down, which is normal but we’ve got new players coming in. It’s about finding that rhythm but now we’ve got everyone back in, it’s about clean sheets are our base and from there we’ll be solid.

“We want to get to a Cup Final this season. We need to get to a Cup Final. That’s the aspirations we have as a management team, that’s the aspirations we have as a team as a whole.

“We’re in every trophy, apart from The FA Cup that we were never going to win, so the goal is, as in every game, is to win and in cup games you’ve got to win those ones to get as far as you can and we’re doing really well in that sense so long may it continue and at the end of the season we’re in a cup final and we end it with silverware.”

Oakes added: “There you go, you’ve got a sixteen-year old that’s still at school and you’ve got a seventeen-year-old and various other young players and they’re playing against people that have played Step Two, Step Three, so difficult to sit here and be critical.”

Fisher, who also beat First Division side Bridon Ropes 4-0 here in the First Round, face a much tougher test on Saturday when Jamie Coyle brings his Whitstable Town side to St Pauls.

The Oystermen threw away a 2-0 lead to lose 3-2 to leaders Bearsted in the Challenge Cup tonight and arrive in Rotherhithe in second-place in the table on 28 points (nine wins, one draw and two defeats), level on points on Kevin Stevens’ side but with a game in hand.

“We go into the Whitstable game ready to go and excited,” said Darwish, who recalled Fisher ended Whitstable promotion bid last season by winning a penalty shoot-out 4-3 after a 1-1 draw at Belmont Road.

“There’s no pressure on us, all the pressure’s on Whitstable and we’ve just got to go and enjoy that game and put a good account of ourselves.

“It will be a very, very hard game, so we’ve just got to enjoy it, believe in ourselves and see what we can get out of the game.

“They’re going to be a solid, strong team. They won the Vase last season. We had them in the play-off semi-finals last season and we know what they bring to the game.

“We have fond memories of that game but this is a completely new season, a clean slate and I think a lot of that core changing room are going to want to put a lot of their demons right in that game, so it’s going to be a bit of a grudge match for them on Saturday, so for us it’s just about not getting hooked into it, not getting put into the fire and just enjoying the game.”

Reflecting on his side’s current league position, Darwish said: “It’s still early in the season, a lot can happen but the league table doesn’t lie.  Like I say, there’s no pressure on us, as long as we can get our performances to the standards and the consistency we know we can get it to then we have our own aspirations and our own standards.  We believe we can be hitting but we’ve got a young squad and it’s not about putting pressure on them.

“We still in all the trophies bar the FA Cup, so we’re in every other trophy now and an ok league position (five points adrift of the play-offs), so where we are at this point in October is absolutely fine.

“There’s still a lot to work on and a lot to improve on but it’s not the end of the world and the squad we have is strong enough to fight for the aspirations that we have.”

Oakes takes his side to ninth-placed Lewisham Borough on Saturday, before playing two sides beneath them in the league table in Banstead Athletic (home, 8 November) and away to Chessington & Hook United seven days later.

“Our next three league games are very, very important. If we take the positives, the limited positives that they are from this evening and we put them into our next three games, we mustn’t feel sorry for ourselves. Just need to dust ourselves down, write tonight off, it doesn’t matter at all in the grand scheme of things, learn from it, of course, make sure we’re better moving forwards and we get a couple of centre-halves into the club and we’ll be in a much better place, very quickly.

“Being in the bottom five is not good enough frankly and that’s why we’re shopping and I think if we get our recruitment correct and we perform well in the next three games the league table will look a little bit better.

“It’s not going to change overnight. I’m not naïve enough to sit here and say we’re going to win all of the next three games. They are winnable but I’m not going to take those games for granted at all.

“We need to perform. I’m not bothered where we’re sat at this point in October, the position that we’re at the moment. We need to recruit. We need to be more consistent with the players that we’ve got, we need to work harder on the training ground because we haven’t trained for a month because of midweek games and we’ll start worrying about where we are or being pleased about where we are maybe end of November, beginning of December.

“Lewisham have been on a good run, one of the few sides I’ve not seen yet this season, although there’s familiar names on the team sheet.

“We know the management reasonably well and one of our players was at Lewisham until recently, so we’ll gather enough intel for us to prepare correctly ready for Saturday and hopefully make them more worried about how we’re going to do, rather than the other way round.”

Fisher: Isaac Ogunseri, Michael Sarpong, Kelvin Bakare, Tyron Mbuenimo (Conor Darwish 83), Ange Djadja (Stephan Richard-Kingson 65), Adejola Lahan, Omari Williams, Tom Jones (Sha’mar Lawson 56), Jake Lovell (Marko Jovanovic 56), Flavio Jumo (Sonny Thwaytes Tylee 65), David Mata.

Goals: Jake Lovell 10, 20, Omari Williams 53, Harry Beech 54 (own goal), Sha’mar Lawson 69, 89

Booked: Ange Djadja 63, Sha’mar Lawson 88

Welling Town: Zak Howard, Glen Bain, Kevel Sesay-Ince, Harry Beech (Herve Mbongue 58), Luke Hearn, Tejan Heywood, Leo Onye, Harry Mark (Seb Pedroza 70), Lewis Lembikisa, Harvey Roberts, Jordan Samuel.
Sub: Sewa Marah

Booked: Seb Pedroza 88

Attendance: 158
Referee: Mr Kennedy Kikulwe
Assistants: Mr Ashley Overbury & Mr Ashley Barnes