You'll be foolish to write us off, warns Tonbridge Angels boss Tommy Warrilow

TONBRIDGE ANGELS boss Tommy Warrilow says he will not stretch the budget to bring even more success to Longmead Stadium, writes Stephen McCartney.


The Angels go into Christmas sitting in 12^th place in their inaugural Blue Square Bet (Conference) South campaign with 28 points from 22 games.

They are ten points adrift of fifth-place or eleven points clear of the relegation zone.  But Warrilow is looking upwards going into their remaining twenty league outings.

He said: “We’ve not had the best of times of late.  All the stats have been thrown at me that we haven’t won in the last six but I’ve thrown back that and said we’ve lost four of our last ten as well so you can look at it either way.

“To be fair to some of the criticism we haven’t been at the races on a couple of Tuesday nights but I felt on Saturday we deserved more out of the game than we got out of Havant & Waterlooville.”

Reflecting on the 2-1 home defeat, Warrilow added: “I thought we were the better side in the second half but we’ve come away with nothing.

“We just have to learn when we’re in control of games to take advantage of it and we’re still not doing that as every team at this level will have their little patches in games and it’s important you have to make them count.”

Warrilow has lost Michael Boateng and Kayne McLaggon following their loan period from Bristol Rovers had expired and admitted it’s been hard to bring in new bodies.

“I need to try to freshen things up, like I did when the Bristol Rovers boys came in,” explained Warrilow.

“Unfortunately at the moment there’s not a great deal out there that I believe will improve what we have.  Money comes into it as well and I said from day one we won’t over extend ourselves and I don’t think we have to this year.”

Reflecting on their up-and-down league campaign, Warrilow said: “We’re all a little bit frustrated how it’s gone but halfway through we’re 12 points of the play-off spots and we’re eleven points being off the bottom three.

“We just have to make sure we improve in the second half of the season and learn from the first half and make things count when we’re on top of games.

“It was a bit of an unknown event coming into it (Conference South).  We knew about a few of the sides but I’m disappointed we haven’t got more points on the table but there’s no point moping about it.  We’ve reflected on it in a few training sessions and hopefully we’ll improve in the second half and turn these performances into wins.”

He added: “If you get a few wins under your belt then the picture changes, the atmosphere around the club changes and everything’s rosy in the garden again but we’ve let ourselves down by a couple of poor Tuesday night performances.

“I’m always honest and if you take those two Tuesday’s out of it all the games we’ve been there or there abouts.  We’ve could have come away with more but we haven’t so we just have to accept it, learn from it and grow from it and just make sure the second half of the season is a little bit less frustrating than the first half.

With sixty points left to play for, Warrilow says people shouldn’t write off his side.

“I’m one of those players where I’ve written out maximum points and until it’s out of our reach them I’ll always push upwards,” he said.

“This year was always going to be a big ask because we’ve just come into this league and the idea of the club was to establish ourselves and have a sound financial footing over the next two or three seasons, to push on to the next step and that’s what we’re trying to do.

“That won’t stop me as a manager to push my players for promotion.  If we went up again, I’ll push for promotion in the next one (Conference Premier).

“I’m not going to kill the lads or go overboard as we’ve stepped up.  We’ve got to learn with what we’ve done in the first half of the season. 

“I still feel a majority of these boys can play at this level and above.  We need a bit of tweaking in certain areas and that’s what we’ve got to try and do.

“We’re not going to do it in our first season and extend budgets and put us under unnecessary pressure really.  At the start of the season everyone wanted us to finish fifth-from-bottom.  Now all of a sudden being halfway is not acceptable for some people.

“But there’s 60 points still to play for and all the time there’s that amount of points to play for I won’t dwell on the negatives.  You’ll see me looking at the positives and if we we’re a little bit more professional in games we could have some more points on the table.

“We’re not a million miles away  We’ve done ok this year.  If people are writing us off at the moment that’s a foolish thing to do because anyone on their day is capable of beating anybody in this league.”

Tonbridge Angels travel to Bromley on Boxing Day, before welcoming Mark Goldberg’s side to Longmead Stadium on New Years’ Day.  Both games kick-off at 3pm.

Bromley have picked up only one draw from their last eleven games and have slumped to just one place and two points above the relegation zone.

With second-choice goalkeeper Paul Agu now with Ramsgate, Goldberg has unveiled the signing of Lloyd Anderson, 21, from Hastings United, and the former Brentford stopper will make his Bromley debut against the Angels as Tommy Forecast’s three-month loan spell from Championship club Southampton has expired.

Warrilow said: “I’ve seen Bromley a couple of times this year and at the end of the day they’ve got some issues, which I’m sure they will sort out.

“I know Jerry (Dolke, the club owner) over there for a long time and Mark (Goldberg) has come back on board.  Between the pair of them they’ll do alright.”

Warrilow is looking forward to the Kent derby, especially the home game as the derby should attract a bumper crowd, especially it being the only football match being played in Kent on the first day of the New Year.

“Looking at all the Kent sides in this league and we’ve looked forward to them,” he said. 

“We gave ourselves a very good account of ourselves against Welling the other week and we’ve been to Dover away and again more than held our own and at Dartford we were involved in a very good game of football.

“Our crowds are up this year, which is great.  With all the Kent sides in it that’s the added attraction.  We’ve still got Dartford and Dover to come to us.  We had a good crowd against Welling and we’re hoping for the same against Bromley especially on New Years’ Day.

“Like Boxing Day, some people venture out for some fresh air and watch their local sides.  If we can capture a few of them it all adds to the long-term plan.”

With two games against the same opposition in a short period of time, Warrilow added: “The one thing I won’t worry about is squad rotation as I haven’t for a big enough squad to do it.

“All I want to do is to get Boxing Day out of the way first and then worry about New Years’ Day.”

Visit Tonbridge Angels’ website: www.tonbridgeangels.co.uk  

Bromley  v  Tonbridge Angels
Blue Square Bet South
Boxing Day, Monday 26^th December 2011
Kick Off 3:00pm
At Hayes Lane, Bromley, Kent BR2 9EF