Sevenoaks Town 1-0 Tunbridge Wells - Rough diamond Shinners can play higher, says Jones

Tuesday 16th March 2010

SEVENOAKS TOWN 1-0 TUNBRIDGE WELLS
Bulmers Cider Kent League
Tuesday 16th March 2010
Stephen McCartney reports from Greatness Park

SEVENOAKS TOWN boss Simon Jones says his match-winning striker Bill Shinners could play at a higher-level as his eighteenth goal of the season grabbed the points in tonight’s west Kent showdown at a chilly Greatness Park.

The nineteen-year-old striker chipped the ball over Slovakian born goalkeeper Michal Czanner to claim the home side’s 12th league win - of their best ever campaign - and to move to within three points of second placed Herne Bay in the Bulmers Cider Kent League table.

“He’s stepped up from County League and park football and he turned up as a little bit of an unpolished diamond, a little bit of a rough diamond,” Jones told www.kentishfootball.co.uk afterwards.

“I presently think he’s one of the most improved players. At the start of the year he was always capable of scoring goals - and he’s proved that - but behind those eighteen goals you don’t see the work-rate that he puts in for the team. Every corner he’s back defending, he’s running channels for us constantly and he wouldn’t have done that at the start of the season.”

Jones added: “If he keeps developing as he is, there’s no reason (why he can’t play at a higher level.) The world’s his oyster. It’s up to him how far he wants to go but it all depends how hard he wants to work.”

Shinners’ strike-partner, Joe Creasey, had a couple of early efforts on goal, which were comfortable for visiting goalkeeper Czanner and at the other end, Keelan Mooney was denied by a low save from Sevenoaks keeper Sean Funnell.

The match-winning goal, however, arrived in the 21st minute, through some poor defending from the visitors - and a clinical finish from Sevenoaks’ hottest property.

Midfield general, Danny Ward smashed a ball over the top of the Tunbridge Wells defence and Jason Bourne and Scott Whibley allowed the ball to bounce over them and Shinners raced towards the penalty area and chipped the ball over the advancing Czanner with his right-foot and celebrated another goal as the ball dropped down into an empty net.

Shinners broke through the heart of the Tunbridge Wells defence a few minutes later but his right-footed swept shot bounced past the foot of the far post with Czanner beaten.

But Tunbridge Wells finished the half strong and Sevenoaks keeper Funnell made two comfortable saves from striker Jon Pilbeam - one a left-footed drive and then a far post header following Andy McMath’s swept in free-kick from the right.

Tunbridge Wells were the better side during a one-sided second half, but they lacked quality in the final third, and had they had a goalscorer up front (big target-man Benji Agana was ruled-out through another hamstring injury), then they might have collected at least a point.

Free-kick taker McMath floated in a 63rd minute free-kick into the Sevenoaks penalty area but Whibley rose at the far post but guided his header across goal, rather than troubling Funnell.

But they were to rue their best chance to equalise a couple minutes later when Mooney’s whipped in a looping cross from the right, and the ball landed at the unmarked Carl Cornell, but he flicked his shot wide from the edge of the six-yard box.

Sevenoaks, who relied on Jamie Johnston’s long throws too often (this ugly method of trying to score should be removed from the game of FOOTball as God invented grass to be laid on the ground not the sky!), were denied a flattering second in the final two minutes.

Once again the visitors didn’t cut out Ward’s driven ball through the two central defenders and substitute Tony Atkins raced through but the striker was thwarted by the big keeper, who stuck out a strong hand to tip the ball onto the outside of his post and out for a corner.

Jones breathed a huge sigh of relief at the final whistle and said, “The result was more important than the performance. It was always going to be overshadowed by the derby and the emotion of it all.

“Everybody’s having games coming thick and fast at the minute and tonight I felt we were a bit wary, a bit leg-heavy but we got the give credit to the boys. They ground out a hard result and I probably thought the one moment of quality off the whole game was our goal. That was a great finish by Bill Shinners.

“I said to Martin Larkin at the end of the game I felt his team probably showed more desire and probably had a better performance in certain areas but ultimately I believe that we showed more ability in the clinical areas and that was proof in the pudding tonight.

“I can’t remember Sean having a save to make, although they did come close on a couple of occasions, a little couple of half chances.

“But credit to my boys, they worked hard and recovered the situation and we’ve come good in the end.”

Tunbridge Wells manager Martin Larkin, who was also speaking to www.kentishfootball.co.uk, compared both side’s firepower as he reflected on his side’s ninth league defeat of the season that leaves them rooted in tenth place in the table with eight games left to play.

“On possession and on terms of dominance, we absolutely dominated the game and we were definitely the better side tonight,” said Larkin.

“But one mistake and one goal and that’s what they’ve got here, they’ve got very good forwards here in Shinners, Creasy and Atkins and you give them one chance and they’ll score! That’s all they had! We had a lot of the ball today, we’ve got in behind them, we’ve played really, really well.

“We’ve had a big reaction from Saturday (where we gave Fisher their first home league win of the season) - we’re very happy with the performance, if not the result.”

Reflecting on the winning goal, Larkin added, “He didn’t have much to do, he’s just lifted it over the goalkeeper to be honest.

“It’s a mistake, we’ve not covered round a long ball. They must have hit another 70 long balls in the game and we’ve dealt with all of those but we didn’t deal with that.

“That’s why their third because when people like that get a chance they put it at the back of the net. We had a couple of chances and they didn’t quite take them. That’s the difference. That’s why you don’t get many teams in the top three that don’t have a goalscorer.”

Larkin added: “If we play like that every week, we’ll win a lot more than we lose.”

Whilst Sevenoaks are able to pay their players, courtesy of Jones’ company sponsoring the club, Tunbridge Wells (arguably the bigger of the two club’s) don’t have a playing budget this season, but Larkin has challenged his players to follow’s Shinners lead.

“What we need is someone to step-up in our team and put that ball into the back of the net 25 times a season,” said the Wells manager.

“If we do that we’ll win a lot of games. It will take the pressure of the back four because our back four on paper is very strong. We’ve got a brilliant goalkeeper but they’re constantly under pressure because we’re not scoring enough goals.

“That needs to come more from around the park. It needs to come from the front guys, the midfield players and set-pieces. We try to challenge Perry (Spackman) to do the same as Lee Shearer does over at Faversham as he’s got the ability to do that.

“We need to score more goals around the park and if we do that we’ll be fine.”

Sevenoaks Town: Sean Funnell, Toby Webb, Michael Cook, Jamie Johnston, Danny Ward, Ossie Bayram, Kyrone Josephs (Tony Atkins 60), Daniel Twin, Joe Creasey, Bill Shinners (Badar Mohamed 90), Chris Walker.
Subs: Oliver Miles, Daniel Apoveta, Adam Porter.

Goal: Bill Shinners 21

Booked: Toby Webb 58

Tunbridge Wells: Michal Czanner, Jason Bourne, Tom Davey, Sam Phillips, Scott Whibley, Perry Spackman, Charlie Sharman (Brad Draper 73), Andy McMath, Jon Pilbeam (Mike Lord 62), Keelan Mooney, Carl Cornell.
Subs: Nick Graham, Steve Ashmore, Alex Day.

Booked: Jason Bourne 77, Brad Draper 90

Attendance: 82
Referee: Mr Adam Bakalarz (Bromley)
Assistants: Mr Thomas Vandapeer (Maidstone) & Mr Ryan Whitaker (Bexleyheath)