Hello friends, a fine run last month had propelled us to the top of the table. Our main task for this month is to ensure that the team keep up the good form and consolidate our position in the BSP. There is 6 games to be played including a FA cup 4th round qualifying match against St Albans. Lets take a look at the results.

Another unbeaten month for us, we had 5 wins and a draw. The wins against York and Macclesfield is what pleased me the most as we scored 2 important victories against our rivals for the title.

An impressive victory against a team who is lying in 6th place. Macclesfield had some good players in their team and i was particularly wary of  Andrew Isaac. If you remember, i loaned him for 3 months last season and i like him very much as a player. He had made some improvements this season and had been scoring goals for fun in the shirt of Macclesfield. Lucky he didn’t perform well today. Both sides had almost identical shots and on target shots. Our strikers made the difference today. Izale Mcleod had a brace, both scored in similar fashion as he raced on through ball to put the ball into the net. His goals were centered by the first goal from Kiernan Hughes-Mason and the final goal by Marc Richards to give us a comprehensive victory.

We had a hard time facing Chelmsford last season as their goalkeeper  always seem to perform very well against us. We couldn’t defeat them last season but they had been struggling in the bottom half of the table so far, so it was the best time to gain a victory over them. It was quite a boring game, they were defending with 8 or 9 men most of the time, it gave us some problem and as a result we didn’t create much in this game. But Kiernan Hughes-Mason was in good form this month, in the 55 minutes, after receiving a through ball in the 6 yards box, he cut inside shrugged off his marker and placed the ball in the far corner to give us a 1-0 win.

Next up was the biggest game of the month, 1st place vs 2nd place. York is currently few points behind us, if we beat them the gap between us and them will be wider and the chance of promotion is increased. But it will not be an easy game for us as we are visiting their home ground. Their defence was in sixes and seven today and my players were given ample space in the 6 yards box to scored 2 goals in the first half. First Izale Mcleod was unmarked when he received a pass from from Marc Richards to drive the ball into the net to give us a lead. Steven Leslie headed in the second goal after a fine cross by my right back Olly James. He was again given enough time to direct the ball into the net. I bet they had a hairdryers treatment by their manager and they came back very strongly in the second half. We were under tremendous pressure but my players handled it very well though they pulled a goal back in the 80 minutes. It was a fine performance by my players to record a win against our rivals.

Confidence should be sky-high after the win against York, i was hoping that my player will be taking the game off Ebbsfleet, but it doesn’t turn out to be the case. We were very poor in this game and allow them to take a lead in the 15 minutes. We are lucky because we have a quality player in Izale Mcleod and he saved us for the day with a well take goal in the 31 minutes. Besides fatigue and tiredness, i can’t figure out why we performed so badly in this match. Overall i am pleased with a point gained but not the performance of the players.

In this FA cup 4th round qualifying match, we were drawn against St Albans who was relegated to non-league football in 09/10 season. I made 8-9 changes to give a rest to the first team players.  The fringe players actually performed very well with right back George Francomb scoring a rare goal and Josh Falkingham scoring his first hat-trick of his career. We qualified for the first round of the FA cup and will be meeting Brentford  a league 1 team.

Last game of the month was against Dover champions of BSS last season. They struggled in this match against our passing game. They were doing the defensive work most of the time and had only 1 shot throughout the whole game. But my strikers were not having their best days, Izale Mcleod was woefully out of form today. Out of 10 shots, only 2 were on target. But luckily for us one of them gone in scored by Marc Richards.

We found ourselves consolidate our 1st position after the games and with 6 point difference between us and York, things are definitely looking good at the moment. I was awarded another manager of the month after leading my team to 4 victories and a draw. The biggest challenge now is to continue the good form but i am not sure how long can the good form last. I am a bit concerned with the fitness of my players as they get tired easily. I have some reservation on rotating the players everytime as it will disrupt the balance of the team. I will see how things go and then decide what to do next.

We will be playing 6 games for next month including the FA cup 1st round, some tough fixtures in there. Lets see how my team performs in November. So this will be the end of my October updates and i will see you in my next post Thurrock-November 2012 results.