Hopes that Welling United had to build on their decent home record were dashed with a disappointing defeat against Eastbourne Borough. Peter Taylor, the Welling United manager, offered no excuses.

“It was a disappointing performance.” he concluded. “It was a deserved win by Eastbourne. We were second best, especially in the first half. We improved, second half, we were a bit better, but the first half wasn’t good enough. Too many people were having too many problems and it made us into a nervous team.”

Any suggestion that it was pace up front by the Eastbourne strikers was down-played by Taylor who argued “I don’t think it was their pace. I think it was their minds. They were thinking running forward but we weren’t thinking of running back. We were too slow in our reactions. I think their reactions were quicker than ours, that’s why they looked quicker.”

Taylor also disagreed with the notion that players were getting in behind the wing backs too easily. He said “I don’t think that it was the wing backs. I think it was more central defenders were getting beaten by through balls and it’s something we’ve got to handle a bit better. 

“We improved a bit on that second half but then, all of a sudden, they go and get a goal and we should have dealt with it better. You have to deal with it. The first goal was the one that beat us and if it means we concede a second by going for the equaliser, I can live with that. There are just things that we’ve got to handle better.”

In the entire ninety minutes, Eastbourne’s goalkeeper Lee Worgan was only called upon to make one save when Danny Parish headed towards the bottom corner. Taylor said “A decent header from Tom Derry and Danny just couldn’t get any pace behind it unfortunately but we didn’t test them enough. On the ball we can do a lot better. Offensively, we’ve got to do a lot better.”

Picture supplied by Will Allen.