Sittingbourne go into Saturday’s last game of the Isthmian League season still needing a point to guarantee a third successive season in the post season play-offs.
But for their opponents VCD Athletic however, they would just be grateful to be part of the pyramid come August as following the sad news last week, this will be the Clubs last ever fixture!
Brickies boss Reece Prestedge is still looking to take his side into post season and whilst last Saturday’s 2-0 win over Hassocks has taken his side to the brink, they still need at least a point from Saturday to guarantee a trip next week.
Speaking to Prestedge this week, we started with the sad demise of their opposition – he told us, “We were all very sad to hear the news that Saturday will be VCD Athletics last ever game! No one in the game likes to see a side fold for whatever reason – there’s a lot of heritage at that club, over one hundred years they have been around.
“Saturday is a sad day for non-League football particularly here in Kent! I don’t think that there will be anyone thinking anything but that and I am sure that it will inspire the players to go out in style!”
“All that said, we have to do what we have to do on Saturday – it’s all part and parcel of the job facing us, we still have to win, we want to win and we have to come out with the right mentality unfortunately for VCD as we still have something to play for.”
Looking back at last weekend’s much needed win, the Brickies boss went on, “Last weekend was a great performance all round and a great way to respond to the Ashford defeat. To a man the boys did their jobs, really put the effort in and were on it – you could feel the vibe all afternoon, even when the teams were in the tunnel and they heard our fans, singing and cheering , that gave the boys a heck of a lift but that’s what they have done every week and I just hope that they do it again on Saturday in what will be our final home game of the season regardless of the result!”
“We knew that Hassocks would play a certain way, so we matched them which was a bit different, but we have played that way before. I looked at it and if it were man for man basically all over the park, we would get the result – we wanted to go bit for attacking wise and wanted to put them under pressure and we did that!”
Prestedge only arrived in the Woodstock hot seat in my November following Ryan Maxwell’s departure and reflecting on his time in charge, Prestedge said thoughtfully, “It was always the plan when we first arrived to hopefully get into the play-offs at least. It something that at no point have we taken for granted – we knew that we would have to earn a place and that’s what we have done. We have worked hard enough to get there and be in this position – the credit has to go to the boys for that!”
“With everything that we’ve been through in the twenty-seven games we’ve had – what with all the Tuesdays we have played; the month off we had at the turn of the year – it does feel like we have done a full season since we came in back in mid-November.”