Sittingbourne 0-1 Folkestone Invicta - Abbott fents his fury at Kent rivals

Invicta climbed up to third place in the table with a hard-fought win over a Sittingbourne side that have failed to score on home soil so far this season.

Striker James Dryden’s second goal of the season, with thirteen minutes remaining, settled this disappointing derby, in front of a crowd of 277.

“Spills (the injured Lee Spiller) was saying you’ve got to come to these places (and win). The pitch wasn’t too bad, but it wasn’t very nice, it was hard to get it down and to be fair to them they worked really hard across the midfield and stopped us playing,” Cugley told www.kentishfootball.co.uk afterwards.

“I thought we deserved to win and on another day, it could have been a little bit more.”

Jimmy Jackson’s corner was met by James Everitt’s header, which bounced off the crossbar and Dryden, who returned to the club from Dover Athletic in the summer, looped the ball over Rob French to settle this Kent derby.

But some pin-point crosses from right-sided midfielder Lee Gledhill presented the visitors with some good chances during the game.

Dryden sent a bullet header over, inside the opening six-minutes, and another chance came the striker’s way, but his left-footed shot arrowed over.

But Invicta striker Andy Pugh, who is on loan from Coca-Cola League Two side Gillingham, had the best chance to break the stalemate after nineteen minutes, drilling a left-footed shot just past the foot of the left-hand post from picking the ball up in space and trying his luck from 25-yards.

Blue shirted Invicta, who suffered their first defeat of the season on Saturday, going down 2-1 at home to 100% leaders Walton & Hersham, called Sittingbourne goalkeeper Rob French into action just three minutes later.

French, who is on a dual registration with full-time Blue Square Premier outfit Ebbsfleet United, and is bravely playing despite a broken wrist, made a comfortable save from Nick Humphrey’s looping header from just inside the penalty area, after another Gledhill delivery.

Sittingbourne, playing a 4-5-1 formation, due to the unavailability of strikers Tom Bradbrook (ankle) and Richard Brady (groin), should have done better with their only real first half chance.

They were also without midfielder Ryan Johnson, who is on a dual registration with Blue Square South side Welling United, and wasn’t given permission by Wings manager Andy Ford to play as he played yesterday.

Dave Milton skipped away from Folkestone’s left-wing back Mark Green and whipped in a cross, which was brought down by Elie Kayembe’s chest, before he cracked a left-footed shot, which sailed over.

Folkestone had the first chance of the second half when Jimmy Jackson cut-back a corner for Gledhill, who’s angled right-footed drive flashed wide of the far post.

Striker Kayembe was forced wide by defender Nick Humphrey and from an acute angle all the former Ilford striker could do was lash his left-footed shot over.

But Sittingbourne were desperately unlucky not to grab the lead with 59 minutes on the clock.

Billy Manners’ cross from the right was met by a glancing header from Kayembe, which beat goalkeeper Charlie Mitten, but agonisingly bounced down off the top of the far post.

Folkestone had a goal ruled out within two minutes when Pugh was adjudged to be in an offside scramble when he smashed the ball into the net, after Dryden’s powerful header crashed off the crossbar and caused a goal-mouth scramble.

But following Dryden’s 77^th minute breakthrough, Folkestone created two more chances against a shot-shy Sittingbourne side.

Dryden’s solo run opened up the Sittingbourne defence but his drilled shot brought a smart low save from French, diving low to his right.

And Pugh, who started his run from the half-way line, latched onto a ball over the top by Micheal Everitt, before racing towards goal and after rounding the advancing French, he took the ball too wide, which enabled Ian Varley to clear the ball off the line.

On chances, Cugley’s charges deserved to pick up their third win from their opening four league outings.

“They hit the post once but we had a goal disallowed, they said it shouldn’t have been disallowed and we had two or three good chances second half,” highlighted Cugley.

But Cugley admitted he expects more from Dryden.

“He hasn’t really got going and he knows that,” he said. “He’s missed a couple on his left foot tonight that you’d expect him to put away.”

But the long-serving boss is pleased with his club’s third place position after four games.

“I think it’s a funny league really because it’s near enough, even after these early days, it looks like the sides who are going to be there or near enough are already up there,” he said.

“I think we’ll play some good football and our aims are to be in the play-off’s.

“I thought we did (bounce back) and showed great character. I had a bit of a moan, I don’t think we were quite at the races Saturday, we’ve given away some poor goals.

“It was our first clean sheet so hopefully the first of many because I think we’ll always score goals and on a bigger, flatter pitch, we will get it down and pass the ball.”

For Sittingbourne manager Gary Abbott, he was “annoyed” with the way Folkestone Invicta had inflicted his side’s second successive home defeat.

“Big-spending Folkestone, I’d like to say a bit more, I don’t want to swear,” Abbott fumed, when speaking to www.kentishfootball.co.uk afterwards.

“It’s annoying, we’re trying to play football the proper way and they come and smash the ball and nick three points.

“Alright, if that’s the way they want to play, that’s why they dropped out the Ryman Premier.

“You can see that I’m happy with the boys, I can’t fault the players, everyone of them ran their hearts out, I can’t fault it but all that money and all they can do is kick the ball fifty yards. It makes me sick to be honest with you!

“As a neutral, I think they’d say Sittingbourne came out and played a good game of football, on the other hand, they’d say Folkestone smashed it.

“But they’ve got three points. I don’t think it’s deserved. I thought we played them off the park.

“It’s just annoying we couldn’t nick it at the end there but that’s football, they nick three points and that’s the way it goes.”

Abbott felt his side had done enough to earn a point.

He said: “We’ve gone out and played the way we want them to play football and to lose 1-0, I think 0-0, alright, would have been a fair result for them probably but I think we were the better team all day.

“It just annoys me that they’ve got all that money and all they want to do is smash the ball.”

Despite naming Army fitness instructor Adam Thomson amoung his substitutes, that will be the only time that Brickies' fans' see the Chatham Barracks based target man. 

“I’ve just let him go,” revealed Abbott. “I’ve just seen him in the warm-up, he’s not going to be up to our level.

“We had two on the bench at 3 o’clock this afternoon and he was just one of them, get him on the bench. Someone’s phoned me up and said his this and that but I get that all the time and until you see him play in the warm-up, I could tell he wasn’t good enough, so I’ve just released him.”

Abbott was forced to switch his formation to a more defensive 4-5-1.

“We had to change our formation tonight, we would have gone 4-4-2, but we changed it to a 4-5-1 and I thought everyone’s done well,” he said.

“It’s just so annoying that we’ve lost to a really bad goal, a set-piece where concentration has let us down again but I think we could have won the game.”

Sittingbourne: Rob French, Ryan Andrews, Grant Duff, Ian Varley, Billy Manners, Colin Richmond, Dave Milton, Pat Gradley, Elie Kayembe, Nick Reeves, Hicham Akhazzan.
Subs: Tarik Ozresberoglu, Sam Baker, Adam Thomson, Joe Horlock, Steve Williams.

Folkestone Invicta: Charlie Mitten, Lee Gledhill, Mark Green, Liam Friend, Matt Bourne, Micheal Everitt, James Corbett (James Everitt 36), Andy Pugh, James Dryden, Nick Humphrey, Jimmy Jackson.
Subs: Byron Walker, Liam Dickson, Josh Burchell, Naz Jevons.

Goal: James Dryden 77

Attendance: 277
Referee: Mr Paul Kelly (Walderslade)
Assistants: Mr Keith Scudder (Gravesend) & Mr John Barnard (Erith)