Lovell wants Trophy ties settled on the day - EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

Sittingbourne will be hoping Bath City’s miserable home form continues during their FA Trophy second qualifying round replay tonight, writes Stephen McCartney.

Bath City, the British Gas Business Premier League side, failed to impress during the goal-less stalemate at Bourne Park on Saturday.

The Somerset have won only once at their Twerton Park base in nine attempts, which was a 2-1 win over Bishops Cleeve in the previous round in front of their lowest crowd of the season last time out.

Sittingbourne will be without their manager Steve Lovell, who is playing in a golf tournament in Portugal but the Welshman has every faith in his management team of Rob Udburg, Chris Daisy and Gary Wisdom.

They will also be without midfielders Clint Gooding, who serves a one-match ban, and Steve Searle, due to work commitments.

But Lovell feels FA Trophy ties should be settled on the day, just like the FA Vase competition, to avoid long midweek trips.

“To be fair we would like to finish the game on Saturday whether it could have gone to extra time or penalties,” he said EXCLUSIVELY to www.kentishfootball.co.uk.  

“I think it’s got to be sorted out. People have to realise that these boys have to go to work in the week, they are not full-time players so it’s difficult for them.

“I’d like to see it on a Saturday, the FA Trophy settled especially as you’ve got to travel a lot of distance.

“I was looking forward to having a clear week this week to get the boys time, they’ve had three games a week now for how many weeks and it takes it’s toll.

“Injuries and tiredness takes it toll and with them working full-time, well it’s difficult.”

But Lovell insists his side has a chance of progressing into the third qualifying round, with either Bromley or Tooting & Mitcham United visiting Bourne Park on 25^th November.

“The ties no means over,” he said. “I think we can go and do it and give them a good game down there.

“They’re better away from home bit they have to break that record sometime and hopefully it’s not against us but we’ll go down there and roll our sleeves up and have a go, which we always do, and hopefully we can get something out of it and get the win.

“There’s a nice pitch down there, it will suit us, we’ll knock the ball around and we’ll play quite well and we do play well on a decent pitch so hopefully we can go down there, knock it about, and get a result.”

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Bath City v Sittingbourne
FA Trophy Second Qualifying Round Replay
Tuesday 7^th November 2006
Kick Off 7:45pm
At Twerton Park, Bath, Somerset BA2 1DB