Bet Victor Premier table toppers Folkestone Invicta head to Wingate and Finchley this weekend with boss Neil Cugley keen for his side to return to their winning ways after their FA Cup exit last weekend.
“Delighted and a bit shocked really,” Cugley admitted to KSN when we asked him about his side’s start to the season.
“They’ve done me proud and played some good football, but just felt in the last couple of weeks that we haven’t been at our best. But up to then we’re obviously very pleased!”
“I think that there will be people surprised at where we are especially as you know we like to recruit from the League below and give them a chance and to be fair to the players they’ve shown what can be done.”
“That said, the year before last we made the Play Offs; last year we just missed out by a point! So, this is the third year that this team has been together and maybe they’re doing themselves a lot of justice at the moment – the squad hasn’t changed much and so that must help!”
Top of the league they may be, but last weekend Folkestone crashed out of the FA Cup losing 2-0 to Kings Langley of the Bet Victor Southern Premier.
Cugley admitted, “Massively disappointed if I’m honest and was down for two or three days afterwards if I’m honest. But these things test you, and you must bounce back – it does hurt, it’s a great competition and we didn’t do ourselves justice!”
“I don’t think that in the last couple of games we’ve played anywhere near where we can and we’ve got to get the ball down – we’re a footballing side and get playing again and to have that defeat – it was a setback – and we’ve got to get over it.”
“When you’re top of the League, people will want to knock you off and even though it’s a Cup-tie they wanted to show that they were a good side and we’ve got to get used to sides doing that now!”
“I didn’t look at the draw (Kings Langley will play Corinthian Casuals in the next round), but someone told me. But that’s it – it’s gone! And we can’t look back in life and in football you’ve always got to move onto the next game, and I’ve been in the game long enough to know that and it’s all about the next game and let’s prepare for Saturday.”
“We’ve got Wingate and then second placed Hornchurch both away – I think this is a good League, it’s a very competitive League and when you see the results come in after the games on a Saturday everybody beats everybody at this standard.”
“You’ve got to be mentally strong, believe in yourselves and get on with it! I’ll just look forward to the next game and then worry about Hornchurch afterwards – let’s get Wingate out of the way; it’s not an easy place to go but it’s a lovely pitch there, I do have to say that – it’s something to look forward to, we are top and the players should be proud of that!”
Cugley then confirmed the look of his squad for the weekend, “Kieron McCann wouldn’t have played if we had had a game on Tuesday and is a doubt whilst Ian Draycott and Ronnie Dolan are slowing getting back to fitness.”
“They’re training and they’ll be in the squad and aren’t far off full fitness and give it a week or ten days could be challenging for the starting line-up,” the Folkestone boss told us.