Sandmann Digests Dorking Loss

Mike Sandmann was pleased to see his side react positively to the weekend’s heavy defeat on the road with their performance against league leaders Dorking Wanderers on Tuesday evening.

Speaking after the 1-0 loss at Hartsdown Park, Sandmann said:

“It is obviously never nice to lose a football game but after Saturday we needed a positive reaction and when it was 11 versus 11 I think we caused them far more problems than they caused us and deserved to score.”

“When you’re taking on a team as strong as Dorking, in the form they are in, you cannot afford to make any errors. Going down to 10 players – especially so early and during a phase when we were dominant – was a hammer blow and I think it could have been a different outcome had we kept all 11 on the pitch for 90 minutes.”

It was a bright opening to the Bostik League game and with a young attacking line up, Sandmann was pleased with the start The Gate made.

“After the heavy loss on Saturday and looking at Dorking’s 6-0 win at Folkestone, there was no sign of fear or apprehension.”

“We asked the boys to work hard and express themselves and credit to our attacking players, they showed the physicality required to cause a defence as strong as Dorking’s some real problems.”

“Defensively too, we limited them to very little in the first half to the point they had to make changes at the break. With the players they were able to deploy from their subs’ bench, their quality did cause us problems.”

Sandmann added,

“Louis pulled off some good saves and with the man advantage we stood up well to them pinning us back. Ultimately, it took a clinical moment from one of the league’s top scorers to break them down.”

“Despite our hard work we don’t have anything to show for it which is disappointing. Playing with 10 men for 70 mins against the league leaders is always going to be extremely tough but I can't fault the players’ work ethic and desire.”

“The players won’t stop working to turn results around and this evening I think they showed character and unity and hopefully we’re not too far off of turning that into a quality result.”

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