Heath will take positives and learn from defeat
Flackwell narrowly beaten by leaders Risborough at Wilks Park
Flackwell Heath assistant manager Paul Shone believes it is important to remain positive despite his side’s narrow loss to Risborough Rangers at Wilks Park on Saturday and insists there are plenty of lessons for his players to learn.
The Heathens led 1-0 against the league leaders at half-time thanks to Fabian Driffill’s deflected free kick. But for a lengthy period after the break, Rangers put the home side to the sword and the pressure was too much to handle.
They snatched their equaliser from the penalty spot, after the referee had noticed a handball in the 66th minute, before a cross not competently dealt with allowed the visitors to take the ascendancy just under 20 minutes before full-time.
The defeat brings an end to a streak of three games unbeaten for Flackwell Heath, but they will have an opportunity to start a new run when they travel to 16th-placed London Colney this Saturday (February 5).
Reflecting on the game, Shone said: “We will take the positives from it because we still have a very new, very young group who are always learning. They will be better off going forward now for the rest of the season after this.
“It’s okay to keep winning, week in week out, but players can only learn so much from that. They’ve got to take things on board and learn from a defeat. A draw would’ve been a fair result truthfully, but credit to them (Risborough Rangers), they are where they are for a reason.
“They found a way to win on Saturday. That’s what we stressed to our boys after the game, sometimes you have to find a way and it might not be pretty. So, we will learn as managers, and they will learn as individuals.”
Shone added: “Putting Saturday’s actual result aside, the performance from us was good. To be fair, they have always been good. You look at the defeats we’ve had since Chris and I have come in and they’ve been narrow.
“There hasn’t been any team we’ve played that we’ve thought have been far superior to us. We will address things tonight (Tuesday) and we will just move on to what we want to achieve on Saturday.
“We will go into the weekend after hopefully two good training sessions in a confident mood. Hopefully we will have a few bodies back too and be fit and fighting, ready to go, and able to get back winning.”