We’ve freshened things up and I’m still hoping to bring in a striker
It’s fair to say last Saturday’s 3-1 defeat at Concord Rangers was not a good day at the office.
I’ve watched the game back and what was most frustrating is the amount of chances we created that we didn’t put away. Then two individual errors gifted them goals and suddenly we’re chasing the game.
But Concord are a good side and that was proved in the week when they beat league leaders Bromley.
We’ve reached the halfway stage of our season now – there’s 21 games left and 63 points to play for.
Our next two matches come against Farnborough on Saturday and at Dorchester on Tuesday night.
We’re 13th as it stands – performance-wise I don’t think we deserve to be as low as that, but obviously results say differently and we’ve won only once in the last seven.
We have to learn to convert chances and put teams to the sword.
What we’re desperately trying to do is keep in touch with those in and around the play-offs.
We may have been descending down the league of late but two wins can put you back up there and that’s where we want to be.
I’ve spoken to managers who say we’re a different team to last season and if you take away the most recent results we’ve been in the top six to eight for most of this season.
If we can finish in the top 10, that’s a great achievement on the budget we’ve got.
On Tuesday, I had a meeting with the chairman Tony O’Driscoll and my assistant Tristan Lewis and prepared a half-term report, if you like.
It was a detailed breakdown of the squad and finances, with the cost-per-start of each player, how much it might cost to improve certain areas, that sort of thing.
It was about establishing if we’re getting value-for-money from some, and if we’re spending too much money on fringe players.
We had a very good meeting and it was decided we could spend to improve the squad.
As a result, this week we’ve brought back Dan Wishart, on loan from Alfreton, signed Inih Effiong on loan from Chesham and added two new centre-halves.
Ben Brown has come in from QPR, and made his debut at Concord, and Ben Gerring arrives from Bideford and will go into the squad for the game with Farnborough.
I’m also in discussions with a relatively high-profile striker but nothing is likely to move on that with Tony out of the country at the moment.
The two Bens will give us greater competition at the back. Ben Gerring is a very dominant, no-nonsense centre-half, which is what we need.
Charlie Wassmer and Dean Inman have done very well but I don’t think they’ve had enough pressure on their places to improve them game on game.
We’ve conceded seven goals in our last three matches and that’s too much for me, as a defender.
Healthy competition is a good thing, even at our level, so hopefully everyone will be keen to keep their place.
We are excited about what a fresh-looking side can take us – it almost feels like a new season to me.
While we’ve done OK up until now, I don’t feel 13th is a fair reflection on us.
We’ve fallen down the league a little because of some poor results and now it’s up to the boys to put it right, starting on Saturday.
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