Although they defended manfully at Maidstone United, Welling United started 2025 with a derby day defeat leaving manager Rod Stringer disappointed.

After the match, Rod Stringer gave his thoughts to Wings TV. “I’m disappointed to come away with nothing.” he said.

“I thought the boys gave us everything that myself and Kev (Watson)  and the rest of the staff would expect playing in a derby, which is a big Kent derby for Welling and Maidstone. I’m disappointed that I couldn’t give them something for New Year’s Day but for the main, I thought that the performance was a full hearted dogged performance.”

“They (Maidstone) are very direct. They don’t give you respite. As soon as they get the chance they recycle it and put the ball behind you again and then they work off knock downs and flick ons so your concentration levels have to be bang on but I thought we dug deep and I thought we kept going and it’s just a shame that when we look back at the goal it’s probably preventable, maybe from the first phase, the corner, but we probably should have dealt with the loose header in the six yard box which has left (Aaron) Blair just to do what Blair does, and that’s to pop up and score goals.”

“Other than that, I don’t think they were loads better than us. It was a tough derby and we had some reasonable chances in the first half.”

Although defeated, Stringer was happy that his players’ attitude was good. He said: “I thanked them (the players) for looking after themselves on New Year’s Eve and I thought they worked hard, they ran hard, and maybe the fine margins, we got done on a little bit of quality but you always expect that coming to Maidstone.”

“We have to recognise this is a tough league. There are no easy games. Everywhere we go, whether home or away, they’re all going to be tough games. We have to keep bringing performances and work ethic, like we did today and we have to take that into our next game.”

“We have to look at Ricardo (Di Trolio). He hasn’t even done a training session with us. He’s come in today. I thought he was outstanding. (Alex) Lankshear’s done what Lankshear does. As a back four, I thought we played very well.”

“Looking at the midfield with the likes of Genie (Kennedy), TJ (Bramble) in there, and Sam Cornish, I thought everybody’s done what it says on the tin. We’ve come here, we knew it would be a tough place, we asked them to do certain jobs and we know going into the Weymouth game it’s going to be tough. We’ve got to just keep focusing on what we need to do.”

Scoring goals is still a problem, which Stringer admits. He said: “We obviously need a really out and out goalscorer who can score goals out of, like today, a situation for Blair, he’s going to be a winner and he hasn’t really hurt us other than scoring that goal. They’re the ones that we need to find.”

“It’s not the fact that we’ve peppered the opposition, it’s just the fact that it’s an opportunists goal and that’s what he’s taken.” 

He also had praise for the fans, saying: “I thought the Welling supporters today were outstanding. I just said to them in the changing room, Welling supporters, when you play and you have a good go, and you work hard, they will always give you a little bit of credit and give you a clap off, and they do that, and they’ll stay with us.”

“As people say, ‘Tough times don’t last. Tough people do’ and we just keep having to have that mentality. These players are always going to go out there and play for that shirt and want to try and turn this around.”

“We are in a relegation situation. There’s no point in us covering it up. When we came here last year we were in the same situation but I’m looking back on those last three performances and I haven’t been overly disappointed.”

“The difference is that we haven’t scored goals when we’ve had opportunities. It’s my job to try and move the squad about and try and find the right formula. I think that if we could find someone who could score us goals that are not always going to be on a plate it gives us a chance to try and build from this.”

“What I see in these (players) is that if we can go and get a win, which may be at home next week, I think we can go on a little run. What we have proved today, we’ve come away at probably one of the toughest places in the league, we’ve got Torquay coming up, and we’re a match for you.”

Picture supplied by Dave Budden.