JOHNSON: WE MUST FIND OUR FEET AGAIN
JOINT-BOSS Anthony Johnson says Chester must forget their Covid woes and get their promotion hopes back on track.
Johnson admitted he thought he was going to die from the virus after being hospitalised in August.
Thankfully, he’s back on his feet and taking charge of affairs alongside Bernard Morley, but since then a combination of injuries and inconsistent performances have hampered their chances of returning to the top-flight via the National League North.
Now, though, the co-boss insists it’s time to move on following two interrupted seasons and says it’s imperative the club got back on track.
“We had a slow start and probably lost three weeks at the back end of pre-season and at the start of the season and were playing catch-up,” he told The NLP after Saturday’s 2-2 draw with Darlington left them ensconced in mid-table.
“We were throwing lads in who were coming back from Covid and we were then picking up injuries. We ended up in a cycle for about five weeks and couldn’t get out of it.
“That said, we’ve not been good enough so far this season. We are amongst the highest scorers, but we have conceded far too many goals which you cannot keep doing.
“The last two years have been tough. We have to create excitement, get the locals and community back involved in the club and show them why we are a decent club to support, but that only comes with winning. The enforced break and then us losing games when the fans came back, was almost like the perfect storm which led to us dropping down the league.”
Former Ramsbottom bosses Johnson and Morley led Salford City to the National League North title in 2016-17 but says nothing compares to the task of trying to propel Chester back into the Football League after 11 years in exile.
“This is my hardest job by a million miles,” he admitted. “At Ramsbottom, we were under the radar, there was no pressure and we weren’t expected to do anything. At Salford, it was the total opposite where the expectations were huge, but you were backed by the owners.
“Here at Chester, expectations are as big as Salford but you are in a different type of market in terms of the type of players you can bring in, so you have to back yourself that you can work with the players you have got.
“This is a massive football club and it’s got a huge history but now you are seeing a lot of bigger clubs in this division all competing for the same players. Half the league is now full-time, so that makes it tough, but we have a belief in what we are doing and in the players we’ve brought in. We are delighted with the lads we can attract and generally it’s because of the set-up of the club. Now, over the last three or four weeks I feel we have finally started to look like what we want to be.”
Johnson, however, has reiterated that frustrated Chester fans will have to be patient for success.
“Our expectations and ambitions are as high as the fans if not bigger,” he concluded. “The majority of people here accept that we have no divine right to be playing in the higher leagues anymore and we have to earn the right to get back up there.
“We have shown progression in the last two or three years. This year we haven’t done that yet, but we still have belief and ambition of doing so.”