My players owe me a winning performance - Abbott

SITTINGBOURNE boss Gary Abbott says his side “owe him one” winning performance in south London tomorrow night, writes Stephen McCartney.

Abbott, speaking to www.kentishfootball.co.uk tonight, has challenged his side to collect maximum points at Dulwich Hamlet, having drawn their last two games.

Leatherhead held the Brickies to a 2-2 draw at Bourne Park seven days ago, before Abbott was frustrated over their goal-less stalemate at Walton Casuals at the weekend.

“To be fair, it wasn’t the best game in the world, it was probably one of the worst games we’ve had so far,” he confessed.

“We set out 4-5-1, just to keep it tight, just to open up to see what they’re like and I changed it after ten minutes to be honest with you because I thought we could get behind them.

“First half, there weren’t a lot of chances, it was quite even, quite a boring first half to be honest with you!”

But Abbott felt his side should have came away from the banks of the River Thames with all three points, having dominated after the break.

“We came out and we just dominated the second half, “ explained Abbott. “It was one of them, we had four or five chances, their keeper pulled off two or three blinding saves, we had some off the line and the defenders’ blocking tackles and all that.

“We just couldn’t score, it was one of those frustrating games where one goal would have won it and we just couldn’t score.

“I’m just annoyed really because we dropped two points Monday night and then two I think again on Saturday.

“It’s getting so tight up there, we have got to go to Dulwich tomorrow now and get three points, so it’s putting a bit of pressure on us, but everyone’s in the same boat around the play-off area.”

Sittingbourne travel to Champion Hill sitting in sixth place in the Ryman League Division One South table, five points adrift of Metropolitan Police, and incidentally travel to Imber Court to play the boys in blue in early April.

Back to Dulwich Hamlet, Abbott, meanwhile, has bad memories of playing Craig Edwards’ side, having been thumped 6-1 at Champion Hill on a frightful Friday night last April.

“We went there last year and got smashed 6-1,” he recalled. “We’ve got a better team now than we had last year. Dulwich are a bit of a bogey side to us, we were 2-0 up at home earlier in the season and lost 3-2. We have to be positive and get it out of our heads and win.

“The players owe us a game tomorrow night, simple as that,” insisted Abbott. “I’ll put pressure on them, they know we have to win six out of the eight.

“We wanted to go out and win Saturday, but it never happened. The games are getting less and less each week obviously, we’ve got eight games to go now so we’ve got to win tomorrow.

“But it’s going to make it harder, we want to go there and win and then we’ve got a home game against Burgess Hill.

“It’s all hard, Walton were down there, Chipstead were down there, Whyteleafe are down there and they beat (league leaders) Cray on Saturday, so you can’t tell in this league.

“It’s all about who wants it on the day and we didn’t want it enough on Saturday and I think it cost us two points.”

Having lost 19-goal striker Richard Brady in a freak horror injury against Leatherhead seven days ago, Abbott admitted his side missed his player-assistant’s presence up front at Walton Casuals at the weekend.

Abbott did reveal that Brady “will probably be out for three weeks minimum,” and added, “We missed him up there, he’s got 19 goals, you miss your top striker in any football division if he’s not missing.

“Injuries do happen and you have to get on with it.”

Abbott added that Ian Varley remains on the sidelines with an ankle injury.

www.kentishfootball.co.uk will be covering this game.

Visit Sittingbourne’s website: www.sittingbournefc.co.uk  

Dulwich Hamlet v Sittingbourne
Ryman League Division One South
Tuesday 24^th March 2009
Kick Off 7:45pm
At Champion Hill Stadium, Dog Kennel Hill, Edgar Kail Way, East Dulwich, London SE22 8BD