26 February 2010

As you are aware, this week Jay Saunders left the club to join Margate. We are obviously very disappointed as Jay was a very influential player and good captain hence the reason we fully supported his appointment as Player Coach. Jay certainly helped us settle in quickly to our new roles at Maidstone United and we thank him for his efforts and wish him all the very best for the future.

Hot on the heels of Jay’s departure Nick Barnes and Jamie Turner both asked to be released and although as yet we have had no approach from any other club they have made themselves unavailable for selection. This is a great shame as Jay, Nick and Jamie were all key players for us and will be hard to replace at this time of the season.

On a positive note we have reacted very quickly to the news regarding Jamie Turner and have signed Andy Walker from Billericay. It is initially a loan deal for 30 days as Billericay’s policy is to loan players a month at a time but we are confident that we will be able to extend the agreement to keep Andy until the end of the season. Andy is delighted to be back at the club and we hope he produces the type of performances he did for us last season.

We had a chat with all of the players before last night’s training session to bring them up to date with everything that has been happening, they were obviously very disappointed with the news but they worked hard and demonstrated a positive attitude in the session that followed.

It is important that we don’t panic regarding the recent squad changes. We know that with the amount of games coming up that we will need to bring people in but it is important that whoever joins will improve the side whilst keeping within our financial budget. We have already made enquiries about a couple of players and we will continue to be busy in this area however we will now have to wait to see what happens as such discussions have to go through the correct channels.

We have picked up 4 points from our last 2 games and we have been pleased with the way we have played in these games. However we will need to be on top of our game tomorrow as we face an in form Harrow Borough side who have collected 11 points from their last 4 games and are also on an unbeaten 6 game run. With regards to the squad for tomorrow, we have some good news as Tom Parkinson is now fit and Jermaine Darlington has recovered from illness so both are available for selection.