BOSS DARYL HAS TONS OF AIMS LEFT FOR URCHINS
DARYL McMahon has urged his Hornchurch champions to go on and be Isthmian Premier centurions.
McMahon’s side sealed their romp to the title last weekend with victory over second-placed Chatham Town.
It’s been an eventful campaign for the Urchins with manager Steve Morison beginning the charge before being headhunted by League Two Sutton United.
That saw former Ebbsfleet and Dagenham boss McMahon handed the keys in late January alongside trusted assistant Steve Gritt.
They completed the remit was to keep the runaway train on track – and the 40-year-old doesn’t want them to stop yet.
“They’ve been terrific,” McMahon told The NLP. “Coming into a winning team – for me and Gritty – is a different situation. Normally when you go into a new job you’re going into a side you immediately need to put your stamp on.
“This group were having a good season, were in a good place when we came in – it was maintaining and putting your own spin on it.
“Relentless is the word we’ve spoken about the whole time. That we’re not going to stop, we need to kick on and move forward.
“Even when we won the league on Saturday, our team talk on Tuesday night (against Cray) was that – ‘it’s Hornchurch, 100th year of history, we’re 12 points from 100 points and 12 goals from 100 goals’.
“That becomes our target now, to try and achieve that. It’s a great season anyway but top it off with something like that is now the aim.”
McMahon took over with the team six points clear at the summit with a game in hand.
A whopping 11 wins out of 13 saw them 16 points clear, still with a game in hand, ahead of this weekend.
And McMahon believes the way the players coped with the target on their back speaks volumes.
“Everyone wants to beat the team top of the league,” McMahon said. “You have to make sure you keep your standards sky high.
“A big thing since I’ve been here, we’ve won maybe three games in the 90 plus minutes. Some people might see that as luck but it’s a trait of winners in that you put a team under so much pressure and in the end they fold. We’ve done that relentlessly to get over the line.
“The second thing you’ve got to manage is – and I’ve been there as a player and a manager before – when you start a season and win games of football, you don’t really feel pressure. You’re just going out and winning.
“But when it gets to the point where it’s today you win and win the title, or today you win and win promotion, days you have to win, it becomes different. People can start thinking about the result more than the performance.
“We’ve had to stay focused and get it over the line and do it properly. A lot of the time the most difficult part of the season is actually getting it done. I am glad we got it done the way we did.”