Rusthall 0-2 Kennington - I can only apologise to the fans - the players let themselves down, they let the club down and they let the fans down and we need to put it right at Lordswood on Saturday, says Rusthall boss Jimmy Anderson

Rusthall 0 – 2 Kennington
Location	Jockey Farm Stadium, Nellington Road, Rusthall, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 8SH
Kickoff	03/04/2023 19:45

RUSTHALL  0-2  KENNINGTON
Southern Counties East Football League Premier Division
Monday 3 April 2023
Stephen McCartney reports from Jockey Farm Stadium

RUSTHALL manager Jimmy Anderson apologised to home supporters after experiencing their third home league defeat of the season in the last nine days.

Rusthall remain in sixth-place in the Southern Counties East Football League Premier Division table with 49 points from 34 games but one league victory in their last 10 outings has made it a disappointing end to their best ever season in the ninth tier of English football.

The Rustics were unbeaten in the league at Jockey Farm Stadium until Scott Porter’s Hollands & Blair won here 1-0 on 25 March, before league leaders Erith & Belvedere won 5-1 at the weekend, before two first half goals from left-winger Rajan Sahni and right-wing-back Liam Middleton gave Kennington a deserved victory here tonight to remain in fourteenth-place in the pecking order with 42 points from 32 games.

“Terrible performance! A deserved win for Kennington tonight and at this moment in time we’re in a little of a bad position I suppose,” admitted Anderson.

“You get what you deserve and we deserved to get beat tonight. Kennington wanted it more, fair play to them, they’ve travelled up from Ashford on a Monday night after playing on Saturday and they gave it their all.

“I can only apologise to the fans.  The fans have been brilliant all season and tonight the players let themselves down.  They let the club down and they let the fans down and me and my management team need to look at it and hopefully put it right on Saturday.”

Kennington manager Dan Scorer said: “Really pleasing. We’ve got a pre-loaded schedule at the minute. We lost our (Challenge Cup) Semi-Final (to Hollands & Blair) last Tuesday and I think against Fisher on Saturday you could see there was still a little bit of a bit of a negative atmosphere around the dressing room because that was us trying to keep our season alive.

“We didn’t quite get our reward for about 80 minutes hard work on Saturday but we’ve come down here, at times for long spells there wasn’t anything pretty about our performance this evening but we’ve come down here and I can’t fault any one of these boys, they were superb.

“We wanted to see that response (at Fisher) on Saturday and we came up against a very good Fisher side and we played them the weekend before and they were a very different side to the one we played them before (as we beat them 3-0 at home).

“We wanted to try to get a positive response from the Cup exit. It didn’t quite go our way so tonight was about going one step further and making sure that tonight’s performance was the one that allowed us to move on from that cup exit.”

Scorer made six changes to the side that lost 3-2 at Fisher at the weekend and the Ashford-based outfit came out with all guns blazing during a dominant start to the game.

Sahni played the ball in from the left towards holding midfielder Kundai Munyama and the unmarked player unleashed a stinging right-footed drive from 30-yards after only 140 seconds.

“We said about coming down here and no disrespect to Rusthall but we’ve looked at their form and can see they haven’t won in four and we saw that Erith & Belvedere clearly started quickly on Saturday and got themselves into a 4-0 lead, so we knew that if we could come down here and start quickly that we could maybe cause them one or two problems and then asses the game and manage the game from there,” said Scorer.

Tommy Lawrence – who was making his 100^th appearance for Rusthall – made a sloppy pass which was intercepted by the impressive Cham, who ran into the box and poked shot from 12-yards which was parried by Taylor.

“Mo joined us just after the New Year and he’s been a real asset to us and he’s a player that I have no doubts will be playing one or two league’s higher in the next year or two, maybe even next season,” Scorer said of 21-year-old Cham.

“We’ll be hoping to keep Mo at the club but he’s a lad with ambition and he’s real quality and we’re glad to have him at the club at the moment and I’m sure he’ll continue to do well.

“I spoke to (Whitstable Town manager) Marcel Nimani about Mo and asked him if he was part of his plans.  Marcel was very honest and said it’s probably a good thing at Mo’s age to go and play football so that’s what he’s come down and done.  I think he’s scored eight goals in his 12-13 appearances since joining us, which you can’t really ask for much more really.”

Cham was impressing against Rusthall’s left-back Mellar, who lasted only 20 minutes as he received treatment on a couple of occasions before being forced off the pitch with a groin strain.

Cham produced some good wing play down the right before putting in a low cross for Sahni, who cracked a right-footed shot on the turn, which only just cleared the crossbar from a couple of yards inside the Rusthall box.

Kennington maintained their early pressure and after 12 minutes, left-wing-back James Haylock-Ashdown unleashed a drilled left-footed angled drive from 35-yards, which was comfortably saved in Taylor’s midriff at his near-post.

“I think we really had a period of sustained pressure in the opening 25-30 minutes and we got our rewards with the goals.  It was nice to see us, not just start on the front foot but keep that pressure, keep that sustained pressure and keep them on the back foot,” added Scorer.

Anderson added: “I don’t think Tommy did much wrong.  It looks terrible, even if you haven’t been to both games, it looks terrible and even if you did go to both games, it is still looking terrible.  If you’re a fan and watched it, we’ve conceded seven goals in two games at home, only scored one and the standards we’ve set ourselves, it’s not acceptable.  I can’t defend the players at all.

“Look, we’ve set out to win the game tonight. It hasn’t worked out. No game is guaranteed that you’re going to get three points and Kennington made it hard for us. They started sharply and we didn’t. They had two chances and Tommy’s pulled off two saves.”

Mellar’s forced withdrawal forced Anderson to play right-back Khalil at left-back, while holding midfielder Jeffrey Njuguna slotted in at right-back.

A fine through ball from Khalil played in attacking midfielder Luke Miller but goalkeeper Stefan Lawrence rushed off his line and smothered the ball low to his left.

Referee Nicholas Monkman stopped play halfway through the first half so that Kennington’s Muhammed Cham and Rusthall’s Abdullah Khalil, Karim Mellar, Tariq Ibrahim, Suleman Bakalandwa and substitute Yassin Fares could all break their Ramadan fast as the sun set over Jockey Farm Stadium.

“I have to thank the red and the officials this evening and the League for their actions in regards to Ramadan,” said Scorer.

“The players were able to break their fast after about 20 minutes into the game. It was a nice touch from the League and the officials this evening to be able to allow the players to break their fast and have a drink and something to eat. It was a really nice touch.”

Anderson added: “It allowed them to get water on and a little bit of food. It was nice for the referee to agree that for both sides.”

Kennington deservedly took the lead with 26 minutes and 49 seconds, courtesy of a well-worked move and a fine through ball and ruthless, clinical finish.

Middleton and Cham linked up well down the right before the ball was played into the middle to 11-goal striker Mitchell Harman, who played a sublime 20-yard through ball which put Sahni in on goal and his first-time right-footed finish was clinical, across the keeper and into the bottom far corner from 15-yards to score his 19^th goal of the season.

Scorer said: “It was nice to see.  We have said to the boys because we went through a period of four or five defeats on the bounce and that came at a time when we were playing a certain way and we were trying to be nice and expressive and allow our front three or front four, whoever it may be, to go out and just play.

“We’ve had to sort of put the reigns on them a little bit because we tried to shore ourselves up a little bit defensive and be a little bit more disciplined in our shape.

“We’re at a stage now where we just want the boys to go out and enjoy the end of the season because they’ve put a lot of hard work in, certainly since the turn of the year.

“We said tonight, listen, go out and express yourselves, by all means do everything that we’ve asked you to do in recent weeks and maintain that discipline but when you’re in that final third go and express yourselves and that’s exactly what that goal was.  It was them being on the front foot, expressing themselves in the final through and I thought the pass from Mitch was superb as well.”

Anderson said: “It’s from our own mistake. Abdullah (Khalil) has gone to play it back to James White, I think, because we had to make a change with Karim Mellar coming off so we had to play Abs at left-back.

“It’s no excuse because they deserved to win but we’re just suffering injury after injury at the minute so that’s another injury and he’s messed up with the pass. He’s played a little sloppy pass back to James White and they‘ve intercepted.  They’ve played a ball, questionable offside, I don’t know, I’ll watch the Veo, but the lad’s put it away and it’s 1-0, so fair play to them.”

Rusthall offered very little in the final third and created a half-chance from a set-piece.

Lawrence floated a free-kick into the box and centre-half Daniel Blunn – who operated as an emergency striker after Anderson made his final two substitutions – flicked his header harmlessly wide.

Kennington doubled their lead with 32 minutes and 58 seconds on the clock, with Middleton notching his ninth goal of the season.

Central midfielder Charlie Owen drilled a ball out to Cham on the right and he whipped in a cross towards the near post. The ball was headed away by Rusthall centre-half James White and Middleton drilled a deflected right-footed volley screaming over Taylor to dip into the top far corner from 30-yards.

“That was a really, really pleasing goal because we have tried to strip it back a little bit and there are moments in the game where we have asked the boys to just turn the ball but in doing so we need to be there to be able to pick up the second pieces and to compete for the second balls a lot better,” said Scorer.

“That just epitomises what we’ve asked the boys to do. Mo’s challenged the header and Liam’s been there to pick up the second ball and he’s got his reward by being able to shift the ball out of his feet and it’s a cracking effort.”

Anderson added: “It’s our own mistake.  Whitey headed it, their man has met it before Tariq Ibrahim has.  Tariq has held his hands up, that’s why he’s had to go off after that because he was feeling dizzy and light headed purely because he hasn’t eaten and drank all day, so we’ve had to take him off because he was feeling weak.

“It’s our own fault. We haven’t given them it because he’s hit a class strike and it's come off our man and it’s gone in but their two goals, the standard’s we’ve set this season, they’re unacceptable!”

It should have been three-nil five minutes before the interval, following a well-worked set-piece.

White’s strong challenge on Sahni gave the away side a free-kick down the right-hand side some 30-yards from goal.

Haylock-Ashdown floated a left-footed free-kick into the box and Liam Whiting knocked the ball back across goal with his head and fellow centre-half Adam Phillips jumped up at the far post and nodded his header just over the crossbar from within the six-yard box.

“I think he’ll be a little bit disappointed that he’s not got the connection he wanted,” admitted Scorer.

“Liam and Adam were both involved in that.  The pair of them have both scored in the last two games from a set-piece so it’s nice to see our defence are chipping in with goals and creating chances for themselves as well.”

Whiting – who operates on the left of a three man Kennington defence – launched a big deep ball towards the back post but Cham’s towering header looped across the keeper and past the far post from eight-yards.

Kennington fully deserved their two-goal lead going into the interval.

Anderson said: “I can’t tell you all but it isn’t good enough! At times we’ve kept the ball in areas we didn’t really want to keep the ball but we’ve kept the ball and we’ve tried to play and we haven’t caused any problems for their back three.

“We haven’t made enough effort to get in and around their box and we needed to improve in the second half. We needed a response because we were 2-0 down.”

Scorer added: “Just continue what we’re doing! We’ve been in this situation many times over the season. We’ve got a relatively young group so we’re at that stage now where we’ve got to start demonstrating that we’ve learnt from previous mistakes.

“I said we have to manage the game properly, get through those tough periods, which we did have, but we had to continue to soak up pressure and defend well and maintain that intensity in the final third, which we did.”

Rusthall’s best chance of the game arrived nine minutes into the second-half and fell to their centre-half White.

Goalkeeper Taylor launched a big right-footed free-kick from inside the centre-circle, Kennington cleared their lines and substitute central midfielder Jamie Miller put the ball into the box with a hanging cross, which was cleared.

Striker Louie Clarke fed Luke Miller with a pass towards the by-line and the cross came out to White, who cut the ball onto his right-foot and steered his shot past the left-hand post.

“In fairness for a centre-half, Whitey’s got hell of a shot on him. He’s normally clinical in training so we were a little bit surprised he sliced that but we’re clutching (at straws) at a chance like that,” admitted Anderson.

Phillips played the ball forward and into Cham, who drove at Khalil before slicing his shot past the right-hand post just before the hour mark.

Kennington won the corner-count by three-two and called Taylor into making a comfortable save following their penultimate corner.

Haylock-Ashdown’s corner came in from the right, the ball was cleared out to Munyama and his first-time right-footed drive from 20-yards was comfortably gathered by Taylor, smothering the ball low to his right to prevent the ball trickling into the bottom far corner.

Fifteen seconds later, a long ball put Bakalandwa through on goal but the winger lacked composure and smacked his shot high, high over the bar and into the adjacent farm.

Anderson said: “The second half just petered out, similar to the first.  They’re defending a 2-0 lead, fair play to them. They’re not taking a touch on the pitch, they’re just trying to turn us and play in our half.

“it was just a bit of a game where you’re kind of standing there thinking it’s dragging on now.  I’m trying to be respectful but the performance by us was just shocking tonight, so fair play to them.”

Kennington missed a chance to increase their lead further in the 77^th minute when substitute central midfielder Harry Lavender played the ball out to Haylock-Ashdown (who was now operating as a left-winger, since Max Sutton slotted in at left-back in a back four), who drilled his left-footed shot across Taylor and past the far post.

“The last 15-20 minutes was non-league at it’s finest,” admitted Scorer, who operates without a playing budget.

“It was a scrappy affair, both sides sort of creating half chances.  I have to give credit to Stefan Lawrence in goal. It’s only his fourth or fifth start this season, obviously Joe Mant’s the club’s number one and he’s a fantastic player but with the schedule that we’ve got and we’ve had in recent weeks, Stef has been able to step in and it’s another clean-sheet for him and I know he’ll be extremely pleased.”

Whiting, Phillips and Luke Hughes’ resilience in defence ensured it was a pretty frustrating night for 29-goal Rusthall striker Louie Clarke, who failed to have a shot on goal, with Kennington’s second-choice goalkeeper in between the sticks.

Scorer takes his side to third-placed Erith Town on Wednesday night, before welcoming Sutton Athletic to Homelands Stadium on Saturday 8 April.  Scorer then takes his side to Gravesend to play Punjab United (11 April), back home to play Welling Town (15 April), before finishing their league campaign with two trips to Hollands & Blair (18 April) and Phoenix Sports (22 April).

“I always say the table doesn’t lie and after such a fantastic debut season at Step Five (finishing fifth with 70 points from 38 games last season), we had ambitions to try to match and maintain those standards that we set,” said Scorer.

“We had a difficult summer losing some big players and this season has been a bit of a building process and we’ve learnt many lessons along the way, including myself.

“This is coming towards the end of my ninth season and on a personal note it’s been a difficult season and I’ve said to the boys we just want to finish the season as strongly as possible.

“When it’s all said and done, if you look at other club’s budgets and fan bases no one would really give us a chance, or should give us a chance.  The fact that we are competing in the way that we do compete and we keep ourselves well away from trouble, I think we continue to punch well above our weight, even if we were to finish fourteenth.

“We still have ambitions to try to push and break towards that top 10 and that’s a little target that we want to set between now and the end of the season.  It’s been a tough season but I’m incredibly proud of what everyone’s put into it.

“Erith Town is going to be another tough one.  We can moan about our schedule but today’s game was the same for both sides.  We’ve got no excuse going into this evening to say there’s anything unfair about our schedule tonight because Rusthall played on Saturday as well.

“Wednesday is going to be tough. We played Erith Town a few weeks ago – I wasn’t actually at the game but I managed to watch the game back - and they were by far one of the best sides we’ve played this season by far.  We lost 3-1 but I’m looking forward to going down there and give a really good account of ourselves again.”

Rusthall travel to bottom-five side Lordswood on Saturday, before playing Stansfeld here on Monday 10 April, before travelling to Bromley to tackle bottom-four side Holmesdale (15 April) and finishing off with a home clash against Bearsted on the final day of the league season.

“On our current form, it’s one of the biggest games of the season because we need a result.  We need to go there and try to get a result,” said Anderson.

“They’re going to be good and they’ll be up for it because they look at us and see we’re not in form at the minute and we need to go there and need to have a reaction.  The boys need to go there with the right attitude, otherwise we’ll get what we got today.”

Rusthall: Tommy Taylor, Abdullah Khalil (Cameron Smart 77), Karim Mellar (Jamie Miller 20), Jeffrey Njuguna (Jack Smith 77), James White, Daniel Blunn, Tariq Ibrahim (Yassin Fares 35), Tommy Lawrence, Louie Clarke, Luke Miller, Suleman Bakalandwa (Addo Amankwah 70).

Booked: Louie Clarke 90
 
Kennington: Stefan Lawrence, Liam Middleton, James Haylock-Ashdown, Adam Phillips, Liam Whiting, Luke Hughes, Rajan Sahni, Kundai Munyama (Harry Lavender 69), Mitchell Harman, Charlie Owen, Muhammed Cham (Max Sutton 69).
Subs: Tom Scorer, Jordan Griffin, Joe Mant

Goals: Rejan Sahni 27, Liam Middleton 33

Booked: Muhammed Cham 15, Charlie Owen 67

Attendance: 134
Referee: Mr Nicholas Monkman
Assistants: Mr Steve Roots & Mr Matthew Pollington