Chatham Town 1-0 Maidstone United

There are now just over two weeks to go until the start of the season and those Stones fans who made the short trip to Maidstone Road to witness a dull pre-season defeat will be glad that they don’t have to wait long for the return of competitive football.

United have now only won once in six pre-season fixtures but nothing can be read into this run of form and two seasons ago The Stones lost just one match out of nine pre-season games only to lose their first three matches of their Ryman Premier League campaign.

After a good victory over Ashford at The Homelands last week, Alan Walker and Lloyd Hume made changes to the starting line up and gave a number of the fringe players an opportunity to impress.

Goal mouth action was at a premium for both sides during the game but mid way through the first half both Sam Cutler and Jimmy Bottle delivered some excellent balls into the box but unfortunately the striking partnership of Ashley Dann and Keelan Mooney could not capitalise on these.

Then on 37 minutes and slightly against the run of play, Chatham scored the decisive goal when former Dartford favourite Steve Hafner drilled a corner from the left towards the near post and Jamie Turner who was under pressure from Lee Barnett, fumbled the ball over the line.

At half time The Stones made five changes including the surprise introduction of Lyndon Rowland and on his return to the club, Rowland came close to equalising with just three minutes left but his shot was cleared off the line.

Prior to this, Maidstone did not really look like scoring although substitute Dan Stubbs’ free-kick on 55 minutes just missed the right hand post and then on 84 minutes, Stubbs set up James Pinnock following a surging run but Pinnock’s shot was wild and flew high and wide of the goal.

Chatham Town: Jamie Turner 37 (OG)

Maidstone United: -

Chatham Town First Half: Tony Kessell, Ray Powell, Ashley Probets, Matt Solly, Richard Avery, Ben Payne, Steve Hafner, Brad Potter, Justin Ascheri, Lee Barnett, Mark Green.

Chatham Town Substitutes: Tom Binks, Michael Scott, Jim Lyon, Darren Hollington, Tom Davis, Ryan Perkins, Rob Denniss, Dan Ellis, Luke Phillips.

Alan Walker

Starts 15 August

Coming Soon...