Sheringham will do the business, says Burman

Thursday 17th June 2010

DARTFORD boss Tony Burman has today continued bringing in Essex based players as he prepares for Blue Square Bet South football for the first time - by signing striker Charlie Sheringham, writes Stephen McCartney.

Sheringham originally started out at two of his father’s former clubs, Millwall and Tottenham Hotspur before going on trial at AFC Bournemouth before signing a one-year contract at Ipswich Town, where he was a substitute in the Tractor Boys FA Youth Cup Final victory in 2005.

He then moved to Charlton Athletic on a free-transfer, before signing for local rivals Crystal Palace and In April 2007 he had a four-month spell in America for Crystal Palace Baltimore.

Sheringham then moved into non-league football, playing for Cambridge City, but his best season was with Kent side Welling United when he scored 26 goals in all competitions during the 2008-09 season, before he signed for the Wings’ Blue Square South rivals, Bishop’s Stortford last May, a transfer fee settled by a tribunal.

Sheringham then moved to Blue Square Premier side Histon on loan in February, before the 22-year-old penned a one-year contract with the Darts today.

“Well, he’s scored a few goals for Welling and Bishop’s Stortford in the Conference South, but he’s still only 22 years of age as well,” said Burman, when speaking to www.kentishfootball.co.uk tonight.

“There was an opportunity to take Charlie from Bishop’s Stortford and I wanted to do it. He’s a young lad, he’s got a lot to learn and hopefully he can settle down at Dartford and do the business - I’m sure he will!”

Burman hopes Sheringham will replicate the kind of goalscoring form that he showed during his one-year spell at Park View Road under Andy Ford.

Burman said: “When you’re confident, the goals go in. His move from Welling to Stortford and he was scoring goals there, but obviously Stortford had some problems financially last year so things wasn’t quite right.

“He’s a young lad, he wants to still work hard and his ambitions are high and when he came to see the ground and spoke to us he wanted to sign and I’m pleased that he has signed for us.”

Burman added another former Braintree Town player to his squad, signing defender Joe Bruce.

Speaking about the 26-year-old, Burman said: “We’ve managed to pinpoint some players who have come from one club. I’m pleased Joe has signed for us. He’s a good defender.”

Both Sheringham and Bruce have signed one-year contracts.

Burman has brought in replacements for Adam Flanagan (Ashford Town), John Beales (Bromley) and Jamie Coyle (Welling United).

He said: “Obviously three of our central defenders, who were excellent for us last year, have gone from the club. I’ve got in two already and waited a bit of time for people to make their minds up. We felt we needed to have five defenders, which is what we worked with last year.

“I will probably have another defender working with us in pre-season training for me to have a good look at, who is of Conference standard, without naming any names.

“It’s very important to me to have players who I know are very good mentality and they want to work hard and be nice and positive and achieve something.”

Burman explained why he has snapped up Essex talent, rather than players from here in the Garden of England.

“We’re in a good location, but we feel that some of the guys around the Kent side of things sometimes ask for too much money,” he said.

“We’re one of the clubs that they come looking at the ground and their looking more at money unfortunately.

“Having said that the (Kent based) guys that have stayed with me, we’ve done good deals for them and they have been rewarded for the good season last year and I’m delighted they’ve stayed.

“We’ve opened the net up a little bit and the guys from Essex have come over and appreciate the facilities that we’ve got and they haven’t been asking for extravagant money and it’s been nice and it’s been excellent to deal with them.

“I’m delighted we’re keeping within our budget and no spending my budget on 11 players and thinking we can have five or six young lads on the bench and be competing in Conference South.

“It proved it last year when we needed 17-19 players and our budgets will be spread across that. There’s not someone on more extravagant wages than anybody else.”

Visit Dartford’s websites: www.dartfordfconline.com & www.dartfordfootballclub.co.uk