Baldacchino demands character following "unacceptable" display - EXCLUSIVE

Thursday 16th August 2007

Wayne Baldacchino has read his players’ the riot act ahead of Slade Green’s trip to Beckenham Town on Saturday, writes Stephen McCartney.

The assistant manager criticised his players following their “unacceptable” display during their 6-1 defeat at Park View Road on Tuesday night, against a rampant Erith & Belvedere side.

And he wants his players to show “character” for their trip to Eden Park Avenue, against a side that opened their campaign with a 1-1 draw at Greenwich Borough in midweek.

“How do we pick them up? Well, to be honest, we need to see some character, they need to pick themselves up,” Baldacchino said EXCLUSIVELY to www.kentishfootball.co.uk.

“We will do what we can as far as systems and play and tactics in training, baring in mind we only see them for an hour and a half in training.

“We’ll do our job, hopefully, they’ll do theirs and after that (their abject display), if they can’t pick themselves up to prove people wrong, they’ve got to question whether they should be playing with the first team or not.”

Baldacchino is dipping into his contacts in a bid to strengthen the squad, with Lee Sugden and Sam Whittington expected to sign for the Small Glen club.

He said: “We do have two or three lads that we’re hoping to bring in within the next week.

“We’ve got an ex-Thamesmead player, Lee Sugden, that we’re hoping to sign on Saturday.

“I think he’ll give us a bit more strength in depth, he’s an attacking midfielder, very quick, very skilful, he’s sort of another John Gallagher, who I thought was by far our best player (against the Deres).

“My old reserve captain at Erith & Belvedere, Sam Whittington, hopefully we’re going to get him on board, but he’s a couple of weeks away from being match fit.”

But Baldacchino - and manager Peter Little - have their hands tied behind their back as the club don’t pay their players.

“We’ve got to be realistic,” admitted Baldacchino. “We’ve probably got a team capable of battling with the bottom five, so our aim is to obviously win the bottom five or six group, maybe seventh possibly, which will put us in the tenth or eleventh place.

“But we do have to be realistic. We don’t have no money to spend so you’re right, we can only attract certain kind of players, players who want to play for the right reasons but that’s our problem.

“That’s something we knew before we went there and something we prepared for.”

The management team will speak to their players individually to curb picking up four bookings in a match again.

“This is something that we’re going to have to rectify, we’re not a dirty side by any stretch of the imagination,” insisted Baldacchino.

“So it’s something we need to look at and speak to, rather than the squad, we’ll have a quiet word with a couple of individuals.

“There’s a little naivety within the squad, there’s a few young lads that have not played at this level before, but we’re not going to panic just yet.

He added: “It’s down to us to rectify and hopefully we’ll get it right against Beckenham on Saturday.”

Visit Slade Green’s website: www.clubwebsite.co.uk/sladegreenfc/

Beckenham Town v Slade Green
Kent League Premier Division
Saturday 18^th August 2007
Kick Off 3:00pm
At Eden Park Avenue, Beckenham

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