Maidstone United striker Danny Hockton is out for revenge at Cray

Thursday 28th October 2010

MAIDSTONE UNITED’S in-form striker Danny Hockton says he has a score to settle at Cray Wanderers on Saturday, writes Stephen McCartney.

The Stones climbed out of the Ryman Premier League relegation zone into seventeenth place as two goals from the 31-year-old striker saw off troubled club Croydon Athletic in a 2-1 win last night.

The former Bromley striker returns to Hayes Lane on Saturday to face Cray Wanders in the second qualifying round of the FA Carlsberg Trophy and he has fresh memories of their league defeat on 5 October.

“When we played Cray in the league I thought we should’ve beaten them really,” Hockton told www.kentishfootball.co.uk.

“We lost 2-1 that day but I managed to come on and score but I thought we should’ve won.

“I think it will be a tight game Saturday.”

Hockton has now scored nine goals this season (scoring in each of his last seven games) and this rich rein of form will delight new manager Andy Ford, who has collected two draws and a win in his first three games in charge.

“I’ve heard different things about Andy over the past,” said Hockton.

“He did try to sign me a couple of years ago when he was at Welling and I opted to go to Chelmsford. It wasn’t for money. I thought Chelmsford were going to d a bit better. Andy ended up leaving that season anyway so maybe it was a blessing in disguise and I ended up coming here.

“You hear different stories about certain managers but I seem to take people for myself really and at the moment Andy’s been fine with me and obviously scoring goals his going to be fine!”

With £3,000 up for grabs for the winners and a place in the final qualifying round, Ford is desperate to get through the Kent derby ahead of his meeting with his French based chairman Oliver Ash. The only Kent football club under foreign ownership!

“He’s texted me a couple of times recently,” said Ford. “He lives in France and I think he’s coming over in a couple of weeks and we’ll have a sit down and have a little chin wag.

When asked about bringing new players to the club, Ford said: “I’ve tried to sign players from other clubs and they won’t play ball because there’s outstanding debts and things so we need to cover some bridges if you know what I mean.”

The chairman keeps fans posted in a blog on the club’s official website www.maidstoneunited.co.uk and his main aspiration is to get the club back home.

Mr Ash said: “We’re working as quickly as possible to reorganise the club, deal with the pressing financial issues and agree the new ground plan.

“It is vital we design the right project before we launch the specific new fundraising and commercial activities because that is the key attraction.

“We know that we will have to plan a fairly basic design at first simply because of the cost. As and when the club starts to earn revenue we can hopefully extend and improve accordingly.

“We have already stated we aim for a budget of £1 million and even this is tight if we want to include all the essentials, clubhouse, stand, car parking, floodlighting and of course artificial pitch. Our preference is for this pitch for all the obvious reasons – it generates revenues, it brings all the club’s teams together on one site, it enables first team games to go ahead in bad weather and it encourages good football.

“However we will have to investigate fully the implications for playing at other levels now and taking a view on future prospects before we take a final decision. We don’t know this yet so please be patient.”

Visit Maidstone United’s website: www.maidstoneunited.co.uk

Cray Wanderers v Maidstone United

FA Carlsberg Trophy Second Qualifying Round

Saturday 30th October 2010

Kick Off 3:00pm

At Hayes Lane, Bromley, Kent BR2 9EF