We'd love to progress in the cups and top five is our aim, says Sevenoaks Town boss Micky Collins

SEVENOAKS TOWN manager Micky Collins says he wants to bring success to the Greatness Park club this season.

The Oaks finished in eighth-place in the Southern Counties East Football League season last season and Collins is searching for improvement during his second season in charge.

Sevenoaks Town kick-off their new league campaign with a home game against newly-promoted side Hollands & Blair on Saturday 8 August 2015.

“I’ve spoken to the lads and I’ve spoken to the chairman (Paul Lansdale) and the coaching team, at the end of the day, we’d love to have a good cup run, whether it will be The Vase, or a couple of rounds of the FA Cup,” said Collins.

“We’d love to progress in the Cup because we didn’t do it last year – and probably a top five finish! I’d be absolutely over the moon with that.

“That will show us progression and then it will give us time for us to get the ground to where we want it to be, which is on the horizon, so let’s slowly, slowly for us, progression.

“We’ve got some good players coming in the summer, strengthened where we need to, not many have gone out and we’ll be a lot steadier.

“We started well last year but we had a mid-season, not collapse, but
it wasn’t great and end of the season we picked up strong, so hopefully we can take off where we left off.

“Top five is our aim, if we can finish in the top five with the side’s that are in the league now, I’ll be well happy with that.”

Collins is a rarity at Sevenoaks Town – he is the first manager for a long time that has lasted more than a season at Greatness Park.

He said: “We haven’t set any targets at all. Me and the chairman haven’t set any targets between us. There’s no real end goal for us at the moment.

“The most important thing was to come in and consolidate the club and make sure the youth now inspire to a decent first team, which for a while it hasn’t quite been here - and get the project going.

“The project was to redevelop the ground the best we can and then dovetail with that having a successful first team to whatever level we can get that to. To where, we don’t know at the moment, but there’s no pressure on me.

“I’m absolutely enjoying it. I love it here! I get supported massively by the committee and the chairman and they let me do what I need to do and they support me with whatever I need.

“I know the boys are enjoying it massively and the management team are enjoying it.

“It is a blank canvas for us. We done well last year to finish eighth. A lot of people looked and thought we started to put Sevenoaks on the map. This season, who knows? We’ll go and if it takes three, four or five years to try to compete to go and win the league, that’s how long it takes.

“We’re not going to rush it. We’re not going to overspend what we haven’t got. We literally work within our means and we’ll be ready when the grounds ready and if that’s time’s right and we can achieve what I achieved at Erith & Belvedere (winning the league title in my third season) then fantastic. If we don’t in two or three years, then so be it.”

Collins admits getting fans through the turnstiles is one stumbling block for the club.

“It’s always going to be the difficult thing,” he said.

“Until it becomes a community hub and then all the youth teams – we’ve got 50 youth teams, including two disabled teams and four girls’ teams – until all of a sudden we make this our home and we make it feel like home that’s always going to be difficult.

“Sevenoaks is prominently a rugby and cricket town but that’s only because it’s never had a successful football team and if we can have a successful football team, whether have a FA Cup run, or Vase, league, or League Cup or whatever, that may turn the tide.

“Then maybe we’ll look at the development that we’re trying to do and our youth teams will inspire to it and all of a sudden we may creep another 10-15 people through the door, but until you’re successful people don’t buy into it.

“Look at the Tunbridge Wells scenario. They built it slowly, slowly, had a great Vase run, got to Wembley and now they’ve got a standard 250 minimum fans every week and no disrespect they haven’t come close to winning the league but they’re still running with that mentality.

“I enjoy it. It’s close to (my Hadlow) home for me so the travelling is close and the me and the chairman get on really, really well. We’ve got the same visions for this place.

“I’m under no pressure. It’s not very often at this level you can just relax and manage a team with no one causing you grief and moaning at you!”

Visit Sevenoaks Town’s website: www.sevenoakstownfc.co.uk