Swifts eye surprise

Heybridge Swifts of the Ryman League Premier Division travel to Exeter City in the FA Carlsberg Trophy First Round Proper on Saturday. Their manager Brian Statham previews the game.

Well Brian it looks like a tricky tie at Conference club Exeter. How do you feel?
We are absolutely delighted with the draw. It will be a great experience for a lot of my boys to go down there who haven’t played in a stadium like that before. Exeter are a very good side and they have a lot of history as well. So we will take the occasion very seriously.

The game is set to attract a decent crowd isn’t it?
Yes, you would expect that as Exeter are well supported. I am sure that a lot of the fans in Devon will hope to see their team get an emphatic win on the day. But football has a real knack of surprising! And we would love to be the surprise package.

Heybridge beat Nationwide South visitors Bognor Regis Town 2-0 in the Third Round Qualifying of The Trophy. How pleased were you with that result?
Very pleased. The boys just carried on with their form from the previous games. Our performances have been up to scratch and have enabled us to get some very good results including the victory over Bognor.

How did the Bognor game pan out then?
As always, you try to get as much information on your opposition as you can. So we knew in advance that Bognor were a very good footballing side. We felt there was a chance to get at them if we pushed them higher up the pitch because of the way they play. They don’t really like going long with the ball, so we pressed them and started at a reasonably high tempo.

It took us 15 to 20 minutes to get ourselves totally up to speed, but once we were there we played some very good football. We deservedly took the lead ten minutes before the break with Michael Shinn’s exquisite free-kick from 25 yards and that set us on our way. Then we capitalised on a late opportunity that fell to Richard Jolly in the 89th minute to make it 2-0.

You are amongst the promotion contenders in the Ryman Premier. How do you assess your league form?
I’ve got no complaints. My players have just got to understand that if they carry on doing what they are doing in the right way, regardless of the opposition, then they will have more success than failure. The guys play a certain style of football that is conducive to being entertaining, but more importantly it is about results. And that is what we have been getting.

The Ryman Premier is very competitive this season with the top spot changing hands on an almost weekly basis. That makes for great excitement, doesn’t it?
Absolutely. It is a very entertaining league with a number of good sides up there. All of the top eight or nine teams are capable of winning the title. The Premier Division has definitely increased in quality over the last couple of years. At Heybridge we are delighted to be in contention. We are geared up for promotion to the Nationwide South in the way that our club is run off the field and that gives us a good footing for moving forward.