Folkestone Invicta welcome Hanwell Town to Cheriton Road this weekend in the Second Round of the Isuzu FA Trophy and manager Andy Drury is keen to see his side progress.
“We’ve got a couple Cup-tied going into the weekend and a couple injured, so our options are a little bit limited for Saturday, but the game will give us a bit of a breather from the League, and its gives everyone a bit of excitement, it’s a different competition and we have a chance to progress and have a decent run and play some teams we wouldn’t normally play against!” the Invicta boss told KSN this week.
Folkestone have reached this stage in some style by putting eight past Ascot United and three past Barton Rovers but the manager stressed, “I keep saying that the performances in the League are there, it’s just little things that have been going against us, a bit of bad luck and some bad decisions, and I am pretty sure that we would have been seven or eight points better off at this stage and up in the play-offs.
“But it’s one of those things and we just have to move forward and concentrate on what we can do, the performances have been there over the course of the season; I can’t remember us being rolled over by anyone and not really outplayed either.
“It’s been the second new squad that I have had to build in the last six months, it won’t happen overnight, just look at Dartford and even Chatham to a certain degree.
“We have had our fair share of suspensions and injuries at the moment and hopefully we can turn the corner on that naming a consistent team which we really haven’t been able to do this season. In the group we have got, they are very good footballers but it’s just getting to know playing together and get some results.
Saturday’s Trophy tie is Folkestone’s third of five successive home games and Drury is happy for home comforts. “It’s time to make the home ground a fortress and make sure that teams don’t enjoy coming down to us!”
Last weekend’s 1-0 win over Cray Wanderers gave everyone at Folkestone a lift, but the manager said, “We had been beaten by Dover on the Tuesday night after out playing them pretty much for the whole game and with ten men for the second half.
“We needed the result against Cray, but the performance, especially in the first half against Cray, we could have easily been four or five nil up, it’s just ironing out some fine things and keep doing the basics quite well. The boys are working really hard, and it shows, but for me it is just about being a bit more clinical in front of goal.”