A sell-out crowd will have the Artic Stadium rocking on Wednesday night when Isthmian League South East club Cray Valley PM entertain League One side Charlton Athletic in a local derby F.A. Cup replay. 

Steve McKimm’s Millers upset the odds when holding Charlton to a draw at the Valley in front of the T.V. cameras in the first game, and they will again be shown live on terrestrial television in the replay.

They have already worked their way through five rounds to get this far, including three replay wins after drawing away so they have experience of winning over two games.

At the Valley, the Addicks went ahead in the ninth minute. Karoy Anderson split the Millers’ defence and Scott Fraser raced through, rounded Sam Freeman, and tucked it away. The Charlton supporters might well have sat back expecting a straight-forward evening but they didn’t take into account Cray’s never-say-die attitude.

Three minutes after the break, the Millers levelled. Kyrell Lisbie got to the bye-line and tried to find Freddie Parker but in trying to intercept it, Lucas Ness could only turn it into his own net. Charlton manager Michael Appleton made five substitutions to try and force a winner but to no avail.

On Monday evening, while preparations were continuing outside the ground, McKimm and captain Arthur Lee spoke in the bar.

The manager said: “It’s exciting times for the club. We’ve had our cup final at Charlton in front of our fans and 6,500. We had a good time there.”

“You don’t always get a second chance. Sometimes people say, the first opportunity, if you don’t take it, it’s gone. We’ll have a good go, we’ll give it a good shot, and hopefully, we’ll progress.”

“It’s going to be a tough night because I think they’ll make changes. If they don’t it’s still going to be a tough night because it was a tough afternoon when we played them at their place. We had a game plan that day, we’re going to have another one this time.”

Skipper Lee said of the first game: “It was the biggest game that I’ve ever played in as a player. It was a lovely day out for the club, for the management, for the players, and also all of our families to be there as well.”

“We all came back to the ground after, all the players and all our families, had a few drinks, put on some music and had a good night.”

McKimm added: “Even if we hadn’t got the result we got, it would still have been a celebration. we would still have come back because of what we achieved in getting to the first round in the first place.”

Although, he agreed that the cup run has been good for team bonding, he said: “We pride ourselves on having a togetherness. The characters that we get in, that’s the foundation of what we try to achieve.”

“The group we’ve got now, from the start of the season to now, they’ve bonded and the success on the pitch is showing from that. Eight wanted to stay from last year, and we brought ten in and they’ve gelled and the results are showing that.” 

That was backed up by Lee who added: “During pre-season it was difficult with one half of the team not familiar with the other half.”

“As the games have gone on the spirit that we’ve got in this team, and how everyone just gets on as mates outside of football as well as inside of football is just wicked really. We’ve got a few characters in our changing room.” 

He continued “No-one gave us a chance in the first game, no-one really expected the replay, but here we are, two days out and we’ve got another chance to try and get a win.”

“Throughout the first game, all that we could hear was from the Jimmy Seed stand behind the goal. Now we have them at this pitch, nice and tight, nice and enclosed.”

McKimm hopes that the exposure will have a longer term effect. “If we can get more fans off the back of it, if it’s twenty to fifty to a hundred, it’s going to help the club move forward.” he said.

It will certainly be a big occasion on Wednesday evening, and the winners travel to Gillingham in what will be another huge game.

Pictures supplied by Dave Budden.