BREHAUT FOUND A QUICK FIX FOR LEEK
WHEN the minds of Leek Town’s players and manager wander to dream of winning the title, they check themselves by remembering one night in November.
A five-goal thrashing at Runcorn Linnets, just days after shipping four goals in a home reverse against Avro, is hard to forget.
“It was a horrible experience,” Blues boss Josh Brehaut told The NLP.
“It was a significant moment in our season, and it still hurts us. In fact, we won’t numb that pain completely until we’ve achieved what we’ve set out to.”
On Tuesday, they were elated after a narrow 1-0 win at second-placed Prescot Cables that left Leek 10 points clear at the Northern Premier League’s West Division summit before kick-off in yesterday’s games.
The Staffordshire side are unbeaten in a dozen outings since losing to Linnets, prevailing on 11 occasions.
They have shut out the opposition in eight of those fixtures, and scored 30 goals too – numbers that prompted Cables manager Ste Daley to concede in a race for first place.
“We’ve been beaten by the team that’s going to win the league,” he rued after the fijoint nal whistle in midweek.
Brehaut, appointed as successor to long-serving Neil Baker in August after he resigned following six seasons in the dugout, insists there is work still to do.
After all, he is in uncharted territory; two brief spells as part of the management team at neighbours Kidsgrove represent his only previous experience of Non-League football before arriving at Leek as assistant manager last summer.
Brehaut said: “This is the first time our advantage has been this big, and I don’t know how we’ll handle it.
“A 10-point lead is amazing, and maybe other clubs will start to say ‘Oh, Leek will run away with it now’, but we won’t be talking like that.
“This group of players is mature enough not to become complacent, and we’re using
those difficult moments earlier in the campaign as fuel to motivate us.”
Leek’s caution is borne out of a painful recent past too.
Relegated from the Premier Division in 2008, they have contested the promotion play-offs six times since – losing twice in the final. The past two attempts ended after home defeats against Runcorn at the semi-finals stage.
They also occupied top spot in the then NPL South East Division, winning 23 of the 28 games they played, when the FA decided to curtail, and then declare null and void, the 2019-20 term because of the coronavirus pandemic.
“The lads’ focus gives me confidence they won’t be distracted,” said Brehaut, whose day job is Head of Coaching in the academy at Port Vale, where he moved after close to seven years working with talented youngsters at Stoke City.
“I’ve learned to have trust in everybody – that’s why we have a squad – and against Prescot they proved how hungry they are. Mentally, they’re strong.”
That ignominious night in Cheshire is not yet a distant memory, but it is fading.
“A lot of things have changed since then,” smiled Brehaut.