In an all-Kent Emirates FA Cup tie this weekend, Margate welcome Folkestone Invicta to Hartsdown Park and boss Reece Prestedge has called on his side to emulate some of the great Gate Cup runs of the past. 

“It’s a massive game for the Club,” the Gate boss admitted, “I don’t think in the last few years that Margate have had a Cup run worthy of the name, so we’re looking to put that right this year.” 

It’s been more than twenty years since the Gate made the competition proper, they hosted Fulham under the SKY TV cameras in 1997 before beating Leyton Orient by the only goal in 2002. But since then, the Gate have reached the final qualifying round just three times. 

“I get reminded of the good Cup runs that the Club has enjoyed,” the manager told us, “But I suppose because they were a long time ago, everyone now is looking for the next one! It’ll be nice for the Club and the fans to have a better Cup run than they have in recent times,” 

“We’ve had a decent start to the League, we set a target for the first month that we’ve fallen short of a little bit but now we’ve won back-to-back games with the FA Cup win over Hendon and last Saturday against Potters Bar, so it’s there or there about from where we wanted to be!” 

“The League this year is probably the toughest it’s been for a very, very long time and there’s not an “easy” ride in the League anymore. When you get the points, you’ve got to be more than happy with them.

“There’s more money being pumped around the League on the back of a few years ago when Billericay spending a big amount that set the tone in certain divisions. There’s also now a lot of players from higher Leagues who have filtered down, so you’re getting stronger players and stronger opposition playing in a League that you probably would not have had a few years ago!” 

“We had a Community Day at Hartsdown Park last Saturday and for us it was really good, the atmosphere was really positive and a crowd of nine hundred really does lift the team.” 

“We’ve got a home tie, we haven’t had many recently!” Prestedge bemoaned.

“We’ve had a couple of tough draws, and we have to take each game as it comes. We played at Folkestone in the League a couple of weeks ago so we know what to expect and where we can be better from that game and hopefully put a performance in to get a result!

“There’s pros and cons to playing a local rival and a side you’ve just played in the League when you get to the Cup, you want to without sounding disrespectful get the lowest possible opposition as you can as you want to get as far as you can but when you get a side that you’ve played recently as we have with this game, you can do a lot of homework on it and prep a lot better rather than a team from a different League.” 

Margate will be looking to have a full squad available for the game which kicks off at Hartsdown Park at 3.00 on Saturday afternoon