I'm confident that we'll go through against Lancing, says Greenwich Borough boss Ian Jenkins

GREENWICH BOROUGH manager Ian Jenkins says he is confident of progressing past Lancing in The FA Cup on Saturday.

The Dartford-based club have been described as the “Manchester City of the Southern Counties East Football League” due to their big budget.

But that didn’t stop Jenkins’ side going down to a shock 1-0 defeat at Phoenix Sports on the opening day of the season last Saturday.

“To be honest with you, we didn’t deserve nothing,” said Jenkins after Ricky Freeman’s second half penalty sealed victory for the home side.

“I said to (Phoenix Sports joint-manager Steve) O’Boyle after the game, I thought they were the better side and they deserved to win.

“Sometimes you have to take your hat off to the opposition and just get on with the next game and that’s what we’ve done. We’ve forgotten about it really.

"We’ve had a little mention of certain things that we weren’t happy with on Saturday and really put it to bed and that’s what we’ve got in that dressing room, experience, to just go out and perform like we did last night.”

Greenwich Borough bounced back with a comfortable 3-0 win over Crowborough Athletic at Princes Park and are slap bang in the middle of a 20 team division after 180 minutes of league football.

Goals from Lewis Wood and Paul Vines gave the dominant home side a deserved 2-0 lead at the break before Gary Alexander, 34, who was playing League Two football for Burton Albion last season, headed home his first goal for the club.

Lancing arrive in Dartford sitting in fourteenth-place in the top flight of the Sussex County League table.

They held relegated Crawley Down Gatwick to a home goal-less draw on the opening day of the season before they went down to a 2-0 defeat at East Preston on Tuesday night.

“I watched them on Tuesday night with Dave Ward, they impressed with what they showed, but they lost the game.

“We’re well capable of beating them if we played anything like we did against Crowborough. I’m well confident that we’ll go through.”

Jenkins’ men are clear favourites to scoop the £1,500 in FA prize money and to earn a home tie against league rivals Erith Town or St Francis Rangers in the next round.

“We’ve all seen upsets through it, lower levels, even in the higher level, there’s upsets,” warned Jenkins.

“We’ll be up for it. The boys will train on Thursday night and we’ll work on a few things that I’ve seen on Tuesday night that we can do against them, a couple of things that they’ve showed that we can do better at.

“We’re not going to mess it about. We’re definitely got to go through and earn some money for the club.”

Meanwhile, the club’s under 21 side play Erith & Belvedere on the 3G pitch at Princes Park at 12:00 on Saturday as the new NRG Gyms Under 21 League West Division gets underway.

Visit Greenwich Borough’s website:  www.greenwichboroughfc.co.uk

Greenwich Borough  v  Lancing
The FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round
Saturday 16^th August 2014
Kick Off 3:00pm
At Princes Park Stadium, Grassbanks, Darenth Road, Dartford, Kent DA1 1RT