Marcus trusts players won’t have lost focus
Flackwell Heath FC: Boss doesn’t want Heath to lose momentum after lockdown
Marcus Richardson hopes that Flackwell Heath’s impressive start to the season will ensure his players haven’t lost focus during the recent lockdown.
The Heathens are top of the Hellenic League table and have lost only once all season – in a competitive clash against second placed Binfield. And with that in mind Richardson is confident his young players will have maintained their fitness and focus on the job in hand over the past few weeks. He’s in no doubt they can win the league this season and hopes this unexpected bump in the road won’t knock them off course.
“It’s been very annoying,” he said. “It’s been boring too. I just want to be out there doing what I feel I do best, and in my case, that’s trying to improve players and trying to win the league.
“You’ve just got to put your trust in the players and hope they’ll maintain their fitness. I can’t see what my players are doing and don’t live close to most of them. What should help us is where we are in the league. I’m assuming the players won’t want to be pushed off their pedestal.”
Flackwell signed off before lockdown with a 4-0 win over
Shrivenham, a result which took them top of the table. They’re due to return to competitive action in the FA Vase a week on Saturday. Richardson has also fixed up a friendly with Milton United to help blow out the
cobwebs this weekend.
“I’ve had this squad for a couple of years now,” he said. “It’s a young squad but hopefully the players trust in each other and they trust in me. I’ve managed to keep them at the club and so far, we’re putting up a real fight.
“Our first game would be the FA Vase next week. We don’t know who we’ve got in that yet and I’m organising a little friendly with Milton this weekend. I’ll also be speaking with the coaching team and chairman this week to talk about the new measures that will be in place for training and matches.
“I don’t think anyone will have let me down. But the situation is that I don’t know what impact this has had on people’s mental health.
“I try to stay on top of things and speak to the players, but you don’t know where people are at fully. Some will have been happy to stay in more, but others would want to be out training and mixing with friends. I hope the squad has had the common sense to stay in shape and have kept themselves going.”
Richardson added: “Everything is my main priority. I want to be a successful manager so, if we’re in it, I want to win it.
“We’re at the highest level of the FA Vase competition and the way my team was playing before lockdown it’s going to take some team to beat us.”