Grays still growing

Grays Athletic 2-0 Woking
The FA Trophy
The Final
3pm, Sunday 14 May 2006
West Ham United FC
Winning club receives £50,000

In the wake of a second successive FA Trophy triumph for Grays Athletic we catch up with Mark Stimson, Grays' manager, following the 2-0 win over Woking at Upton Park on Sunday.

Your team lost to Halifax in the Conference Play-Off Semi-Finals during the week, so they showed great character to bounce back and win The FA Trophy didn't they?

Yes, great character. But they have had that since they reported for pre-season training on 1 July last year. They didn't start getting paid until 14 August, so it is full credit to them that they worked so hard in that period.

I don't think there is any other team in the country that would do that. I just have so much admiration for them all. So they deserved what they got at Upton Park.

How did you go about picking them up after the Play-Off defeat?

We just brought the lads down to Upton Park on Friday and showed them the stadium. You could see in their faces that it was a matter of ' Just let us go and play on that lovely pitch, because that suits us down to the ground.'

The better the pitch, the better the result we will get because of the way we try to play. And over the 90 minutes, we probably had a bit too much movement for Woking.

It was a good performance against Woking wasn’t it?

Yes. We played some good stuff. We go out to try and score more goals than the opposition and nine times out of ten this season we have done that.

We have players who like to create things and who have got pace. I fully believe that if the ball is up the other end of the field then you have less chance of conceding a goal. And we have won The FA Trophy two years on the trot so that is a massive achievement.

Does your success this season make it hard for you to hold on to your better players?

Yes definitely. And it should cost us because some of my lads deserve to play at a higher level. For their own personal careers, I hope someone does come in and bid for them even though that will harm me.

The higher they go, the pitches will be better and it will suit them. They will get there one day because they have the belief and the confidence.

So they just have to keep going, keep their heads down, work hard and it will happen. We don’t stand in anyone’s way here - as long as the transfer is right for the club and the players themselves.

You have reached the Conference Play-Offs and won The FA Trophy this season. Will it be hard to top that next year?

It is extremely unlikely that we can. If we lose a couple of our quality players, then it will make things a lot harder.

We transferred Mitchell Cole right at the beginning of pre-season to Southend United and I have not seen a better left winger than him this year in the Conference. So if Mitchell had stayed with us, we may have gone another step forward.

You had great support at West Ham for The Final didn’t you?

Yes it was absolutely fantastic. They turned up in their numbers and created a tremendous atmosphere. Also, I think the way we performed in The Final will generate more people to the club but that is something we will only see in time.

We are not a team who nick 1-0 results. We try to attack and entertain as well. The fans appreciate that.