In a frustrating afternoon for the home faithful, National League South Welling United were held to a goal-less draw by Southern Counties East Football League Club Fisher.

After the game, manager Warren Feeney spoke to Welling United’s Michael Browne and Radio Wings’ Nigel Jones. He said “I don’t think we’ve done enough to win the game.

“I warned the boys coming into it not to be complacent. It was a dangerous game and it proved to be. Fair play to Fisher. They’ve had a job to do, they’ve come and done it. I’m disappointed in coming from where we are to playing like that. We were too predictable but it’s one of those things. We’re still in the cup and we’ve got a chance to put it right.”

He continued “We don’t change what we want to do but I just feel that the quality wasn’t there. We huffed and puffed, we got a bit anxious. We didn’t show enough quality on the ball, balls going into the box. There weren’t balls going into the strikers, strikers holding the ball up. There was too much (wrong) and it wasn’t us at all today.”

Feeney knew that games like this can be banana skins and said “ The only people you’re going to beat is yourselves in games like this. No disrespect to them, we are the higher ranked team and we’ve got the quality. They were strong in defence. There was no positives in the game. We didn’t do enough to hurt their goalkeeper. We didn’t get the ball wide enough at times but I’m not going to hit the panic button because we’ve been on a fantastic run and it’s just a little blip, and it’s a blip that we can put right.”

Goalkeeper Kai McKenzie-Lyle came in for his debut but was mostly a spectator. Feeney said “Kai did well. I don’t think he had much to do. He was comfortable. It’s positive for him but looking at the whole match it’s poor from us.”

Despite all the work in the week, things didn’t go to plan. Feeney groaned “You prepare them for the games but when they go out onto the pitch, they’ve got to do the right things and I don’t think we made the right decisions today. No disrespect to Fisher, it’s their cup final. People talk like we’re going to do this and we’re going to do that. It’s disrespectful to them. I knew that it was going to be a tough game because I’ve been in that situation before but we just didn’t do enough.”

“We didn’t show enough energy, enough enthusiasm. I think that we only had one shot in the first half which wasn’t good enough from us. Sometimes it can be good because it’s a rude awakening, a wake-up call.”

“They got into tired minds when they think somethings going to happen but you’ve got to make something happen.”

After the game, Feeney didn’t rant and rave at the team and said “I’m not going to be too harsh on them. They know themselves. They’re disappointed. They’re a good bunch of boys, they’re honest. We’ve just got to pick them up again, win on Tuesday, and get them ready for Saturday.”

Welling United: McKenzie-Lyle, Barnes, Ezennolim, Dunne, Olomowewe, Parry, Maloney, Hyde, Azeez, Payne, Elito.

Subs: Roberts, Papadopoulos, Francis, Aransibia, Kassarate, Andrews, Dickens.

Fisher: Amedu, Thomas, Imoru, Usifoh, Fitzgerald, Adewunmi, Bromfield, Sarpong, Thompson, Shoderu, Coker.

Subs: Asonte, Poole, Hoy, Amgbaduba, Darwish, Atkinson, Zeddini.

Pictures supplied by Dave Budden.