Spurs were just too hot for us, admits proud Sawyer - EXCLUSIVE

Assistant manager Paul Sawyer was proud of all his Dartford team tonight - despite Tottenham Hotspurs’ master class at Princes Park, writes Stephen McCartney.

Although the Premiership club fielded just five players with first-team experience, the youngsters from White Hart Lane were just too hot for the Ryman League Division One North hosts.

An excellent Monday night crowd of 2,395 were dazzled by the north Londoners, who came away from north Kent with a devastating 7-2 win.

But despite the Darts shipping six first half goals, without reply, the Kent side won the second half by two goals to one, courtesy of goals from Jay May and Eddie McClements.

Sawyer, speaking EXCLUSIVELY to www.kentishfootball.co.uk after their showpiece fixture, admitted that no-one let themselves down against quality opposition.

“I’d like to say first half, to be honest with you, it was very difficult on the bench, because you couldn’t really help the lads out,” he said.

“Tottenham put out a tremendous team, a team full of lads who I’m sure are Premiership quality.

“It was one of those games.  You just wanted to get to half-time and try and sort things out and change things around a little bit more.

“But you take you hat off, basically they were a tremendous team tonight, and I don’t think our lads are going to come up against many teams like that.

“It’s been a great experience for the boys tonight. No heads have gone down, they’re all very positive.

“I’m really, really, proud of the lads. We stood there second half, myself and (fellow coach) Steve Moseley, and we couldn’t pick out anybody who had a bad game.

“And yet we concede seven goals, but second half, we came out and won it 2-1 and I thought we got stronger and stronger.

“I wanted to get the subs involved as well, but on one hand I wanted to keep it as it was, because we were doing ever so well second half.”

Frenchman, Adel Taarabt, 18, impressed throughout for Tottenham.

“The boy in midfield, the French lad, apparently they call him the new Zidane and you can see why tonight,” praised Sawyer.

“I think some of the boys are still dizzy at the moment - we’re not going to play too many teams like that in our league this year!”

A sell-out full-house of over four-thousand flock through the turnstiles for Crystal Palace’s visit to Princes Park on Friday night (7pm).

“Well, I think Crystal Palace are bringing two teams aren’t they?” asked Sawyer.

“I think that’s what they’re doing in their friendlies so I don’t know if it will get any easier.

“But I’ll be surprised if they’re any better (than Tottenham). They might be similar quality but I’d be surprised if they can be much better than that, because some of the finishing first half, I thought was absolutely tremendous.”

A former Dartford player himself, Sawyer reminded the current crop of players, that the club were playing their pre-season friendlies away from home following their fourteen year exile.

“Part of my team talk tonight was for the last fourteen years we’ve been having our pre-season games all over the place,” he said.

“Tonight was something special for the boys, to play against a top quality team like that in front of 2,000 people, and to be able to do that again on Friday night in front of 4,000, it just shows how far we’ve come.”

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