The club is moving in the right direction, says Corinthian boss Matt Longhurst

CORINTHIAN manager Matt Longhurst says he is proud of the fact that his young side have lost just once at Gay Dawn Farm in 2013.

The Fawkham based outfit finished in their highest ever league position last season when Longhurst guided the amateur club to fourth-place and they are presently sitting in eighth-place in the Southern Counties East Football League table with 24 points from 13 games.

Longhurst takes his side to play fourth-from-bottom Canterbury City at Winch’s Field on Saturday.

“It’ll be a difficult place to go at this time of year,” warned Longhurst.

“Canterbury have really improved recently with some strong performances and with the pitch being heavy at Herne Bay we will have to adjust the way we want to play.

“We did that well last year adjusting to playing on the not so good pitches.

“We’ve proven losing just once at home in 2013 that a good pitch suits us. We now want to improve on our away record which is still ok, losing just three times to VCD, Phoenix and Ashford in 2013 away from home in the league.

“We’ve started the season a little slowly and now unbeaten in six games in the league and cup so we aim to try and put a run together.”

Corinthian have seen a number of players leave the club over the past couple of seasons to play at a higher level of football.

Midfielder Chris Kinnear plays for his dad Chris Kinnear for Conference South side Dover Athletic; striker Alfie May has banged in nineteen goals for Ryman League Division One North side Chatham Town and central defender Daniel Bent was snapped up by League One outfit Gillingham.

“We’ve lost a couple of players at the start of the season to higher league clubs and so we had to rebuild a little and that takes time to gel but we’re getting there,” said Longhurst.

“We’ve had another youth team product Joe Brown come in at right-back and start the last ten games.  Last Saturday saw just two players start the game over 21, which is fantastic.

“The club is moving as a whole in the right direction. Our under 21s are top of the table and our Ryman Youth under 18s are second so we have some real quality coming through.

“We’ve said all along we want to build a club, which is sustainable with values and hopefully success will come with that.

“It can be a little frustrating when teams above us lose a game and sign three or four new players but my passion is coaching and when we lose a game we go back to the training ground and improve on what went wrong then when we win the next game that’s rewarding.”

Looking forward to the second part of the season, Longhurst said: “Going into the New Year we aim to stay unbeaten for as long as possible ticking off game by game.

“We don’t talk about winning leagues and cups that will take care of itself by winning football matches week in week out.

“We’d like to see a bit more consistency in our performances but in general this group of players work very hard for each other and most importantly enjoy coming to football, so we’ll just continue in the same vain.”

Visit Corinthian’s website:  www.pitchero.com/clubs/corinthianfc

Canterbury City  v  Corinthian
Southern Counties East Football League
Saturday 21^st December 2013
Kick Off 3:00pm
at Winch’s Field, Stanley Gardens, Herne Bay, Kent CT6 5SG