Faversham Town boss Ray Turner has been speaking to KSN ahead of their Play Off Final at Worthing on Saturday as his team have defied the odds by reaching the end of season finale after a come from behind win against league runners up Dorking Wanderers on Tuesday night.

Turner told us, “It was a great night on Tuesday especially when you remember that we went to Dorking in January and got beaten 5-1. We learned a lot that night and the players showed a great deal on maturity and the way the season’s gone it was never going to be an easy night and of course we went behind as they started pretty strong and although we were behind, the momentum started to shift our way as we started to assert ourselves mentally. And the second half was fantastic!”

“Getting the balance right after 60 odd games is so important and with the mix of young and old we’ve come so far.  It was great to see both ends of the age range play so well at Dorking – 36 year old John Scarborough got us back into the game and has helped the younger players so much it’s been brilliant. And then Charley Robertson scored the winner late on and I’m so so pleased for him. We took him from Maidstone and he’s done so well. It’s just a shame that it looks like we may well lose him in the summer as he’s moving to the North West but he’s come so far since he signed for us, he’s done so well.”

Just two weeks ago, Faversham’s Play Off chances were all but over after they dropped five points in two games. But the Corinthian Casuals had points deducted opening the door for Turner’s side – a chance that the Manager never expected.

“It’s been extraordinary the last fortnight it really has!” Turner admitted.

“It’s been a real lesson for me as well as any other managers and players about never giving up. We had a period in September when we couldn’t win a game; we kept fighting back to a position on the edge of the Play Offs without ever establishing ourselves and then we had a must win game against Hastings in which we were terrific – we dominated the game from start to finish – and were then in control of our own destiny.”

“We then had big weeks – away at Tooting when I thought we had a good draw – and then had the Cup final defeat against Kingstonian where the performance levels were good but did we get a lesson in finishing that night!”

“We rebounded from that with a 7-0 win on the Saturday before bang! We’re hit with two defeats out of the blue – losing at Sittingbourne which we knew was going to be difficult before East Grinstead took points off us as well and that really hurt me personally. The lads were distraught – I was distraught; I’m always honest with the players and we all thought that we’d blown it, we really did.”

“The days ticked by prepraring for the last game with Hythe trying to do a professional job trying to keep things going. And then on the day before the game I started getting texts about Corinthian’s problems and then our secretary confirmed it after they had lost their points and fifth place.”

“But it still wasn’t in our hands, but we’d gone from the real low of the previous weekend and being out of the equation to now having a chance – albeit a small one – of now making the Play Offs.”

“I know Sam (Denly) and the Herne Bay players quite well and I always felt that they’d give Hastings who were the side that we were chasing, a real game down there and they did!”

“I was never concerned about Hythe as I always thought after watching them that we’d have the fire power to beat them and the day was unbelievable. Of course we’d won 4-0, but at the end the game in Sussex was something like seven minutes behind us and we were just there with the crowd – waiting – and the inevitable 200 mobile phones!”

“But when the news came through, the scenes were fantastic. They were great – they were private between us and the supporters and we were in the Play Offs.”

The Faversham boss then spoke about Worthing, the side now standing between his side and the “promised land” of the Ryman Premier.

“Tuesday’s result against Hythe obviously surprised a lot of people but Worthing are a good young side who can play on their pitch very well. They’ve great speed and they’re a good side throughout and if you switch off against them – as it sounds like Hythe did when they went a man down – they’ll punish you as what happened.”

“All that leads almost everyone including me to think that we’re going to be massive underdogs on Saturday – Tuesday was a huge result for them, but I’ve been in the game as a manager a long time now and one thing that I do know is that two games are never the same as we found out after we put seven past Walton Casuals a few weeks back, we couldn’t buy a goal in the next two games that we played which proves it really is a strange game, it really is!”

“We’ve got nothing to lose in the Final we really haven’t. We came in the back door and have the chance to leave centre stage as it were. The way we all felt after that East Grinstead when we were out of it to be sitting here now talking about the Final sums it up.”

“The euphoria of Tuesday night is carrying us forward now for sure and the fact the Ryman Play Off games are always one off games must help us. That said, it would be wrong of me not to acknowledge the run that Worthing are currently on which has been really good, but we’ve got nothing to lose as two weeks ago we were booking our holidays – I’m just glad that I didn’t book mine until next week!”

“We’ve got players who won’t fear the occasion and whatever little quirks of fate there are let’s hope we take advantage of them in a great football stadium in what I think they hope will be a crowd of over 2,000.”

“We’ll go there to enjoy to enjoy ourselves – two weeks ago it would have been a day trip to the seaside for us; now we’ll go there to try and finish a really remarkable season with a place in the Ryman Premier!”