Having enjoyed a late winner on Monday, Welling United suffered the opposite emotions when conceding an equaliser with two minutes remaining against Slough Town. Although there was disappointment at not seeing the game out, manager Steve Lovell was happy to not have lost.

“We had enough chances, especially in the first half, to win it but then to get in front and concede the way we did, it was a shame. He said. “The boys put in a shift and deserved to win the game.”

He continued  “It’s a point gained. I always look positive. It’s not two points lost, it’s a point gained and it’s two games now undefeated. If we can go another four or five undefeated, we’re picking up points all the time. Points are so important in the league against teams who are going to be around us and they are going to be around us.”

Bradley Stevenson scored his first goal for Welling and Lovell was delighted for him. He said “Bradley should have scored before he scored his cracker. He went through one on one with the keeper and I’d have put my house on he would stick that in because I’ve known him for a long time and he takes them very well but his goal was excellent, an excellent strike. 

“He can do that and it got us in a good frame of mind going into half time and I said to the boys going into the second half that we need to get the ball into Che (Krabbendam) in midfield, and into Bradley, and we’ll create things and that’s what we did. We played football, we got it down and passed it like we know we can do.”

Ben Allen also notched his first Welling goal and Lovell said “Ben Allen, he was at Gillingham with me as a young lad and I know that he can score goals and again, at this level, he hasn’t played too many games and he was a handful for them. He was shattered at the last part of the second half but he gave everything and he’s a goalscorer. 

“He’s got his goal and he could have had a couple more but he’ll get stronger and stronger like the rest of them, as a unit we’ll get stronger and I look forward to the rest of the season. I look forward to every game, it’s no good for your health sometimes, but we love it and we’ll keep doing it.”

Having a back four made up of genuine defenders has also made a difference and Lovell explained “They defended really well. They won their headers and we know that, going forward, we’ve got players who can create things and produce chances and goals. In the first three games we conceded so many silly goals because I had midfielders playing at the back so it’s nice to have four defenders, out and out defenders, who can defend and they did. 

“They defended for their lives today. It’s disappointing because I thought that we deserved the three points, maybe more so than against Concord, so we’ll bounce back and we’ll work on it now for the next couple of weeks and it’s on to the Dartford game.”

After three heavy defeats, Lovell has changed the shape, along with the training regime. He is delighted with the way that the players have adapted. “They’ve taken onboard the system that we play and their roles and responsibilities and they’ve taken them on great but there’s a lot more to come out of them.” he said.

“There’s still players who were not playing today who could be in the side when we play Dartford so it gives me a bit of leeway to have a look at them in training, perhaps have a training game in the next couple of weeks and play them on Saturday so we can see how they are going to do because Dartford will be a different kettle of fish and it will be a good challenge but it’s a challenge that we look forward to because they’re the games that you like to play in so we’ll look forward to that.”

Pictures supplied by Dave Budden.