Erith Town boss Steve O'Boyle swoops for experienced campaigner Lew Watts

Wednesday 04th August 2010

ERITH TOWN boss Steve O’Boyle rues the loss of one of his summer signings for their Safety Net Associates Kent League opener at Holmesdale on Saturday, writes Stephen McCartney.

O’Boyle swooped for strikers Rikki Cable (Thamesmead Town), Billy Shinners (Sevenoaks Town) and Leroy Huggins (Margate), but Huggins has been forced out of the Oakley Road opener.

“Leroy’s injured at the moment, he’s got a neck problem and he’s gone to see a doctor today,” a disappointed O’Boyle told www.kentishfootball.co.uk.

“He’s got a problem with his neck and it’s kept him out a little bit in pre-season. He hasn’t done many minutes on the pitch and he’s struggled with it in recent weeks so I would say Leroy’s out for Saturday.

“He’s a good player, he’s also a good character to have around. Obviously it’s a blow as I would like to give him his debut on Saturday, but that will come in the next couple of weeks.”

The Dockers were expected to change their name to Erith & Dartford Town during the close season, but their merger with Dartford Town broke down at the last minute.

When asked about that, O’Boyle replied, “It hasn’t gone smoothly with things happening off the pitch but as far as I’m concerned that’s a committee matter and as far as I’m concerned I was manager and I’m still manager. I’m the manager of Erith Town. That’s a committee matter and that’s down to the committee to sort out.”

O’Boyle watched Holmesdale during their 3-0 home defeat to a strong Welling United side last night to find out what he’s is going to expect on the opening day of the new season.

“We watched them last night against Welling and we’ve done as much as we can really,” he said.

“We’ve done our homework and they’ve watched us a couple of times in pre-season so they’ve done their homework on us.

“It’s going to be a tough game. It’s not going to be easy going to Holmesdale and hopefully we can go there and be positive and hopefully come away with three points.

“I think they’re going to be hard to break down, they work hard and we’ve got to make sure that we compete and we match up to their work-rate.”

O’Boyle has added experience to his squad with the addition of defender Lew Watts, who was Alex O’Brien’s player-assistant at Chatham Town last season, and has played at all different levels during his playing career around Kent.

“Lew Watts is coming to us as a player and he’s also helping me and Tony (Russell) out on the management side,” revealed O’Boyle.

“Lew’s a good lad, he’s been around the block and he’s played at a higher level. He was at Chatham last year. He’s come in and we spoke to him on Saturday and he’s going to put his boots on this year.”

Having guided the club to an eighth place finish last term, O’Boyle wants to improve on that this time out.

He added: “What are my ambitions? My ambitions is to try and break into that top five. If we can get into that top five that will be a good achievement for us and hopefully we can build on that again the season after.”

Visit Erith Town’s website: www.erithtownfc.com

Holmesdale v Erith Town

Safety Net Associates Kent League

Saturday 7th August 2010

Kick Off 3:00pm

At 68 Oakley Road, Bromley, Kent BR2 8HQ