Tunbridge Wells 1-2 Stansfeld - We're delighted where we are. We knew we could compete at this level because we did it a lot of times last year in the Vase, says Stansfeld joint-manager Jamie Phipps

Tunbridge Wells 1 – 2 Stansfeld
Location	Culverden Stadium, Culverden Down, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9SG
Kickoff	25/10/2022 19:45

TUNBRIDGE WELLS  1-2  STANSFELD
Southern Counties East Football League Premier Division
Tuesday 25 October 2022
Stephen McCartney reports from Culverden Stadium

STANSFELD joint-manager Jamie Phipps says his players’ are a match for everyone on their day after returning to second-place in the Southern Counties East Football League Premier Division table after their first 14 games at this level.

Tunbridge Wells became the first side to take points off leaders Erith & Belvedere this season with an impressive 5-1 away win at the weekend but they found Stansfeld a hard side to break down at Culverden Stadium.

Stansfeld are now nine points adrift of the leaders with 24 points and are now unbeaten in five away league games, although they have played a couple of more games than Tony Beckingham’s pace-setters.

Tunbridge Wells grabbed the lead through Frank Griffin’s free-kick but their lead lasted only 104 seconds as centre-half Rob Bissett scored an own goal following a corner.

Stansfeld went route-one with their second half winner as substitute striker Ollie Milton slotted in his third goal of the season, to put Tunbridge Wells in eighth-place in the table with 18 points from 14 games.

“I thought we deserved it.  They’re a good side, we knew that, they beat us (2-0 a few weeks ago (24 September), so we knew they were a good side,” said Phipps.

“Going down a goal quite early, I think it went through the wall and Charlie Cottrell got down to it and couldn’t keep it out, but the boys reacted superbly, got back in the game straight away and then I thought our shape was really good and they found it hard to break us down in the end.

“We’re unbeaten away from home (in the league), which doesn’t say much about our home form does it?

“We changed our shape again from Saturday’s (2-0 home defeat to Whitstable Town), playing three up front didn’t work for us so we changed our shape. I thought we looked more solid tonight.  We got opened up too many times on Saturday but I thought our shape was a lot better.  Sometimes away from home, if you can keep your shape and make the other team try to break you down, sometimes they can run out of ideas and I think that’s what happened tonight.”

Tunbridge Wells manager Luke Carpenter cut a frustrated figure during the post-match press conference.

“Frustrating, disappointing, lots of different ways, not many positives to take from it if I’m perfectly honest,” he said.

“I can put my finger on about five thousand things that went wrong tonight. I can put my finger on them at half-time and I did.  It was just one of those nights where we haven’t executed the game plan as well, whether it’s been busy days at work, long days, I don’t know.

“You have to give credit to Stansfeld because they’ve come with a game plan, they had to change from how they normally play and how they played us at their place so they’ve played their part in our performance tonight.”

Tunbridge Wells created their first chance inside the opening five minutes when Bissett – who plays on the left of a three man defence – played the ball into Connor Pring, who skipped past Dan Parkinson’s sliding tackle in midfield before laying the ball off to Griffin but the right-wing-back cut inside and drilled his right-footed drive high over the crossbar from 25-yards.

Tunbridge Wells bossed the midfield but they found Stansfeld’s back five in resilient mood with Billy Parkinson keeping sixteen-goal striker Trevor McCreadie in his pocket with an outstanding, dominant performance by Stansfeld’s captain.

“I think McCreadie scored against us in the previous game, he’s a good player but we know that we’ve got good players and on our day we know we can compete with anyone.  Bill’s a class act, we know that and we know we’re lucky to have him,” said Phipps.

Stansfeld missed a glorious chance to take a ninth minute lead, however.

Bissett poked the ball down the line in an attempt to clear his lines from close to the by-line but the ball fell to Ross Morley, who whipped in a cross towards the far post where unmarked striker Lee Friend took a touch and shot straight at goalkeeper Jason Tibble from 15-yards.

“Lee’s been unlucky, he’s had a few good chances in the last couple of games, normally he’d put them away. Lee will get goals, we know that.  Each side of the keeper it’s a goal but he’s hit it straight at him,” said Phipps.

Carpenter added: “He should’ve scored it! I’ll tell you I weren’t overly happy from (minute) one to 90.  I want to say how bad they were, it wasn’t.  I thought we were good, we were generally good with the ball, it was the final third that lacked the creativity, the quality to create chances, decisions.  I think that was our biggest issue. In part it is down to them and part it’s down to us.”

Friend was released down the left and put it on the plate for his strike partner Tommy Whitnell, who swept his first time shot past the foot of the near post after nipping in front of his marker, just 104 seconds later.

“I thought they (Friend and Whitnell) looked good together tonight.  We played with a three up front on Saturday and it didn’t work so we went with the two up front tonight and I thought the two of them worked really hard and did well,” added Phipps.

Griffin drove into the Stansfeld defensive third before teeing up Jonathan Shea – who was part of a Tunbridge Wells three man midfield – who unleashed a low right-footed drive from 30-yards, which was smothered by visiting goalkeeper Charlie Cottrell.

“I felt he could’ve slipped in Matt Gething. He was in a lot of space but he’s made a decision. We’ve had chats about being indecisive so I can’t complain he’s actually made a decision. He’s hit the target so the keeper’s had to save it,” said Carpenter.

Phipps added: “I thought for the first 20-25 minutes they rotated their midfield really well and caused us problems running off the back of our midfield.  It’s going to sound like a mad thing to say, it’s bread and butter for Charlie, we expect Charlie to save most things that go his way.”

Shea then fouled Morley as he went to press him and Dan Parkinson drilled a right-footed free-kick towards goal from 35-yards, which was parried by the diving Tibble before the home side cleared their lines.

“When Dan hits a ball, it stays hit,” added Phipps.  “He takes a lot of our set-pieces so we know if he gets a shot off, nine times out of 10 he’ll hit the target and at least make the keeper make a save.”

Tunbridge Wells should have taken the lead in the 16^th minute during an end-to-end start to the game.

Jack Palmby and Shea linked up in midfield, Johnny Phillips split open Stansfeld’s out-of-position right-back Joe Borland to play Phillips in behind and he had oceans of space to cut into the box.  He crossed low for Palmby, who swept a poor shot across the face of the goal and striker Matthew Gething held his composure at the far post.   With his back to goal, Gething played the ball back to Matthew Astle, who skied his first time drive over the crossbar from 10-yards.

Carpenter said: “If you want to talk about Erith & Belvedere, we done a session here last Thursday and we worked on final third entries, final third creations, types of passes, how we play the passes and types of crosses based on certain areas and how defenders are set so if you want to say what things weren’t working well from Saturday, that was it.  There was about three things within that move along that could’ve been better, final balls.”

Tunbridge Wells grabbed the lead with 20 minutes and 34 seconds on the clock, however.

Connor Pring went on a trademark run into the final third with the ball glued to his feet before he was tripped by centre-half Greg Summersby.

Griffin drilled his right-footed free-kick from 25-yards past the five-man wall and Cottrell dived low to his right and got a hand to the ball but failed to prevent the ball nestling inside the bottom left-hand corner.

“To be fair to Frank, that’s been coming. He’s hit a fair few free-kicks recently.  Canterbury, he was unfortunate not to get a goal or two with some,” said Carpenter.

Phipps added: “Charlie was unlucky. Charlie will be disappointed, he’ll be really disappointed with that.   Charlie won our player-of-the-year for the last three season so that tells you – the players’ player as well – how much he’s thought off by the rest of the team.” 

Whitnell played an intelligent pass in behind Bissett to play Friend through on goal but Tibble came off his line to narrow the angle to make a vital block at his near post but Stansfeld deservedly restored parity with 23 minutes and 18 seconds on the clock.

Dan Parkinson floated in a corner from the right and Whitnell found a pocket of space at the near post and his header sailed across the face of goal and was off target.  The ball bounced off Bissett and bounced over the line in the centre of the goal for an unfortunate own-goal.

“No way! Tommy Whitnell’s goal all day long,” insisted Phipps.

“We wasn’t behind for very long, which is always key when you’re away from home because the longer you are behind you start panicking a little but and maybe you go a little bit more direct and your shape goes a little bit so to get back into the game and equalise so quickly, it kept our game plan intact.”

Carpenter added: “I was so disappointed with that. It’s just poor reactions and I think it summed up our night really, our match control just wasn’t very good.

“I could see what they were doing, they’ve got to take credit for what they did but we’ve been through, we had a similar thing at Kennington.  We knew what to do, we just weren’t doing it.  We were half doing it.  We were half getting out. It was just that final ball, the final ball weren’t great.”

Both sides then went on to cancel each other out going into half-time but Stansfeld appeared the side that were going to score the next goal.

Ezekiel Miller crossed the halfway line and split open Bissett and Johnny Phillips to play a 20-yard pass down the right for Friend to run in behind and he cut into the box but his weak shot was comfortably gathered by Tibble at his near post.

Dan Parkinson’s right-wing corner was met by Whitnell’s head at the near post but the ball looped over the crossbar and after the outstanding Billy Parkinson slid in to send McCreadie crashing to the ground on the half-way line, the ball was passed into Dan Parkinson, whose attempted 40-yard chip sailed over the crossbar.

Both managers were asked their thoughts at the interval.

Carpenter, who plays a passing game, said: “I said a lot, pretty much everything that we were going to see in the second half. We’ve identified a lot of stuff. We’ve identified how they play, we’ve identified how they are out of possession because we were dominating the ball.”

Phipps added: “Just really more of the same.  We knew in the last 15-20 minutes of the first half I thought we were probably the better side.  Their midfield weren’t running through is so easily as they did in the first half-an-hour.

“We said if we can keep the work-rate and tempo, keep our shape, try and force them to go long to try to break us down then we’ll have a chance.

“We had two forwards on the bench (Milton and Adeniyi Lahan) who we knew would cause problems with their work-rate and their pace so we just said to the forwards to keep working the press.”

Tunbridge Wells started the second half on the front foot and referee Jacob Miller controversially threw Morley in the sin-bin in the 50^th minute.

Friend and Tunbridge Wells centre-half Tommy Smith were tussling for the ball and Smith clearly booted the ball out of play for a corner, only for assistant referee Kevin Greenhead and the referee to decide to award Tunbridge Wells a goal-kick instead.

“It’s a tough job for officials, we all know that but I think the only person in the ground, everyone in the ground saw the centre-half kick it off,” confirmed Phipps.

“I don’t think (the referee or his assistant) knew what to give so I think they took the easy option of giving a goal kick.

“Ross got frustrated, he should deal with his emotion better but sometimes decisions cause players to be frustrated when there are obvious as that. We’ll have to manage our aggression in a slightly better way.”

Morley protested and picked up a temporary dismissal yellow card and Stansfeld missed a glorious chance to take the lead shortly afterwards.

Left-back Frankie Beale played a sublime through ball along the deck for Friend to chase and his pace took him past last defender Bissett but he lacked composure just outside the penalty area and lashed his right-footed shot high and wide when he only had the goalkeeper to beat.

“Lee’s a goalscorer.  I think he had a rush of blood once he got there and got away from the centre-half.  Instead of trying to slide it into the corner, he’s tried to put his foot through it and hit it as hard as he could.  I think it’s still travelling,” added Phipps.

Griffin’s first corner from the left failed to beat the first man and Stansfeld cleared their lines.  However, Pring recycled the ball back into the box and Bissett cut inside and a chance opened up but his left-footed shot flashed across the goalkeeper and just past the foot of the far post from 15-yards.

Stansfeld goalkeeper Cottrell pulled off Save of the Season with 15:48 on the clock.

Astle linked up well with Griffin down the right before hitting a deep cross towards the far post for returning striker Gething to cushion his downward header towards goal from a very tight angle.  Cottrell got down low to his left to produce a world-class save to claw the ball out from on the goal-line.

“Top, top drawer save and that’s Charlie,” hailed Phipps.

“A lot of keepers’ heads might have gone down and sulked a little bit but that’s a match-winning save, that is a match-winning save, all day long.

“We broke pretty much soon after that to get the goal.  Top quality save. How he’s got down to it, I’ll never know.”

Carpenter said: “Questionable whether it was in, it really is questionable. I think the goalkeeper’s done very, very well because he’s diving backwards and he’s pushed it forwards so it looked in for me but I can see why the referee hasn’t given it because the goalkeeper’s done well to push that forward outside the post.”

It proved to be a vital, big save as Stansfeld immediately went up the other end and sealed the victory with 16 minutes and 32 seconds on the clock.

Cottrell launched a big kick straight down the heart of the pitch and Milton picked Astle’s pocket outside the box.  Goalkeeper Tibble charged out of his box but Milton skipped past him and slotted the ball into the bottom left-hand corner of an empty net to give Stansfeld something to hold onto.

Phipps said: “I think the keeper could’ve done better.  He kind of came and stopped and then Ollie nicked it through his legs I think. He nutmegged him and tapped it into an empty net.

“It looks like an inspired substitution taking Lee off and bringing Ollie on but the reason we did that because we were down to 10 men. We just knew Ollie would work that little bit harder up front on his own, so it proved.”

Carpenter added: “It’s hard for me to go through that really. I’m not here to throw anyone under the bus so that was what it was. I don’t think that needs explaining to anyone.  We knew that’s their game plan, that’s the biggest disappointment.”

McCreadie jumped out of Billy Parkinson’s pocket for the first time in the game, turning his marker inside the box before hitting a shot on the turn just over the Stansfeld crossbar inside the final nine minutes.

“That’s the one that he’s worked himself.  That’s why it’s a bit more disappointing that we’re not giving enough service to Trevor tonight and Gething,” said Carpenter, who has high hopes for the pair, especially as Gething scored 35 goals for Tunbridge Wells last season before joining Richard Styles at Whitstable Town, before returning after Marcel Nimani recently replaced Styles at Belmont Road.

“There’s no need to panic!  Geth is coming in. We have a specific way of playing. We’ve got a lot of detail that goes into the way we play. He’s just has to learn that but we’ve got to learn what his main strengths are and we can filter that in and maybe adapt a few things that we have do.

“It’s the same as everything I’ve been saying all season, some things take time and that partnership is going to be very, very strong and I don’t think there will be many better in this league or maybe even in the league above. We’ve just got to get it working.”

Griffin then fed substitute, towering striker Jacob Feasey, who hit a first time shot towards goal from 20-yards, only for Cottrell to dive to his right to tip the shot around his post but Tunbridge Wells couldn’t find their way past a resilient back five and suffered their sixth league defeat of the season.

Phipps added: “It’s a normal thing in football, when you’re only one goal in front you kind of sit back and the opposition are going to put pressure on you. They’re quite a big side so they were putting a lot of balls into our box but I thought we dealt with them really well, really well.”

Tunbridge Wells welcome bottom-six side Welling Town to Culverden Stadium on Saturday, while Stansfeld travel to fourth-placed Deal Town.

Carpenter said: “We wipe our mouths from tonight, we reflect.  They know what they have to do on Saturday, we’re not worried about that.”

When asked about his club’s top eight position in the league, Carpenter added: That’s a bit of a different question because we didn’t have a great start to the season. We’ve made a lot of changes from there.  The form table will probably tell you it’s been a little bit different.  If you look at our performances they’ll tell you they’ve been very different.

“We’re still not in a position that we’re wrapping up the games that we should be but we’re playing well.

“We’re putting in good performances, we need to turn them into wins.  We know that we’re bringing in a strong squad now, just building that consistence,.  That’s what it is for me. I think we’ve got intelligent players in there.  They’re getting to grips with our principles and our system and I think we’ll be ok.

“I don’t like losing so I’m not happy.”

Phipps says he is expecting a really tough game on the Kent coast, especially as Steve King’s side thrashed Tooting Bec 7-0 in The FA Vase First Round last weekend and came away from Bearsted with a 1-1 draw in the league tonight.

“It will be a really tough game, we know that, but every game in this league is tough and it has been tough so far,” said Phipps.

“We’ve got 24 points on the board, that’s probably better than what we expected at the start of the season but we just take every game as it comes. If we’re on it, on our day, we’re a match for everyone.

“We’re delighted where we are. We knew we could compete at this level because we did it a lot of times last year in the Vase.”

Both teams are in FA Vase Second Round action with Tunbridge Wells travelling to lower-league side Larkfield & New Hythe, while Stansfeld host Crowborough Athletic to Foxbury Avenue.

Glebe are also at home to Sporting Bengal United and it is hoped that Glebe play their game on Friday 11 November and Phipps revealed why his side do not want to play on the Sunday afternoon.

“We’re hoping that something can be moved because we will be due to play on Remembrance Sunday and Remembrance Sunday is a big, big thing.

“There was a club member in the First World War who won the Victoria Cross. The club fought hard to get a memorial for him down Tower Bridge Road so Remembrance Sunday is a massive, massive thing for the club.  As a group, we have a proper service and we do it the way it should be done, so hopefully someone will help us out and move the game so we’re not playing on the Sunday, but if we have to, we have to.”

Tunbridge Wells: Jason Tibble, Matthew Astle, Johnny Phillips (Rhys Bartlett 70), Tommy Smith, Robbie Bissett, Frank Griffin, Connor Pring, Jack Palmby, Trevor McCreadie, Matthew Gething (Jacob Feasey 82), Jonathan Shea (Jack Walder 65).
Subs: Daniel Tear, James Nurden

Goal: Frank Griffin 21

Booked: Tommy Smith 84

Stansfeld: Charlie Cottrell, Joe Borland, Frankie Beale, Billy Parkinson, Greg Summersby, Ezekiel Miller, Ross Morley, Macey Malyon (Max Conner 80), Lee Friend (Ollie Milton 58), Tommy Whitnell (Harry Day 78), Dan Parkinson (Adeniyi Lahan 71).
Sub: Harrison English

Goals: Rob Bissett 24 (own goal), Ollie Milton 62

Booked: Lee Friend 55, Frankie Beale 90

Temporary Dismissal: Ross Morley 50

Attendance: 152
Referee: Mr Jacob Miller
Assistants: Mr Kevin Greenhead & Christopher Clarke