Dartford v St Albans City Sun 7 May 2023 @ 12.30

[Park Life]

Snalbans score.

[Park Life]

Sheringham scores. 3-2 Snalbans after 3 pens.

[Park Life]

Snakbans score

[Park Life]

Murtagh scores.

[Park Life]

Score and its Snalbans win.

[DA1]

Neither team deserved it. Not surprised about us losing. See you next season.

[Mark Sweet]

Devastated is an understatement, I really thought this season was our season to go up. I would say it's Chippenham all over again but this is worse. We took the lead and then concede a very sloppy equaliser. How that ball has got to their man from that corner baffles me.

Nobody else matches Chin's energy, and him going off played a big part of that loss. Fonkeu was never in the game.

St Albans didn't test Ben in goal for 120 minutes.

Penalties are a lottery, yet we always seem to lose them.

I don't want to get into next season and who we should keep and let go yet as I'm far too emotional. But Dowse needs to get his players in early so we can give it a right good go next season.

[Top Cat]

Can’t argue with the result in the end ,the best footballing team won on the day . We are never going to win FA all the time we play Hoof and Hope and we certainly played that way today . To say I’m disappointed is an understatement , just feel it was the “same old same old “ curse of the playoffs where “Deja vu “gets the Man of the Match award again .

[Dart of Herts]

No one can say the kids bring atmosphere. You could hear a pin drop through most of the second half down by the St Albans end. Most of them weren’t even watching the game.

We really missed Chin after he came off but I’m not gonna go down the ‘what if’ rabbit hole. We were good but St Albans matched us today and their keeper was solid throughout.

[Harry]

Congratulations to St Albans, a disappointing end to our season on penalties.

Not our day, but it has been our season, appreciate its early but really appreciate the players and management teams efforts over the course of the season, for them to finish second is a good achievement.

Disappointing but certainly not downhearted.

[Tall Dart]

Gutted to lose today, especially on penalties. We started very well which was nice to see. Their keeper pulled off a few great saves and won it for them saving the first penalty, but we should have tested him more.

Credit to all the players who took a pen today, not an easy task. I will forgive Samir (as long he stays around for another year).

We will need a great team spirt next year, and the current management team in place, should have our full backing following this season's efforts! Let's win it though, to save the disappointment of the playoff lottery.

UTD'S

[Spike]

A decent effort by our lads and I thought we just shaded the game without maybe doing quite enough to win. In the end though, all that effort getting 2nd place amounts to nothing and we, once again, failed when it really mattered. If I'm honest, I've never really felt the squad was strong enough and I think Dowse did well to get them this far.

Nevertheless, reaching the play-offs counts for nothing unless you win them. It's merely failure over a slightly extended time period. It's like being the last soldier rescued from Dunkirk only for your rescue boat to sink 500 yards from Dover. At the end of the day, your name still appears on the list of the dead. In that context, we have achieved nothing more than, for example, Weymouth. ... except I imagine they finished the season with a smile on their faces.

Lots of work for Dowse to do in close season, particularly with regard to recruitment. No excuses about arriving late this time and the squad needs to be considerably stronger.

[The Duke]

I am pleased that the whole team and subs put in 100% today in what was a tight game that we had chances to win[ especially 2nd half] wheras St Albans didnt have a serious shot on target and their goalkeeper had a very good game , however they played some really good , fast , quality football from front to back with wingers which is something I would like to see us do instead of just being a solid unit lumping the ball out of defence with our lads just chasing the ball and giving the ball away far to often.
Dowse has done a good job with the squad he inherited this season and credit to him for finishing 2nd and losing on penalties today .
What we need for next season is players who are comfortable on the ball and at least 2 strikers who can regularily score goals [Harvey put in a great shift and scored a good goal today ] and has impressed in the short time he has been with us , IMO at least a minimum of 50% of the squad should be released and Dowse getting in contact with the quality players I'm sure he has on his list of needs

I like many are disappointed we will NOT be in the NLP next season but the new teams coming in will make it a stronger , exciting league and we want to be part of it , even winning it !!!!!

MOTM ,All played well but Bradbury for me for his never say die efforts and a classy goal !!!!!!!!!!

[Babylon]

I will wait a day or two before posting.
Far to disappointed to give an opinion on the game
The play offs are here to stay because of the money involved.
But just like England , we don't seem to be able to cope with the pressure of a shoot out.

[KentC]

They play pretty football and we have countless opportunities at goal.
Defence were superb overall today as they often are.
Our missed chances came back to haunt us big time.

Post more in game tomorrow etc tomorrow

[rambo]

Very disappointed with the result bug credit to dowse getting us this far after coming into the fairly late last summer
We started well and Chin owned the right side of the field while he was on , once he went off he was badly missed.
However we did not do enough to warrant a win so I cannot say we were unlucky
We really do need to play some football next season as it will be a very tough division and we must have some creativity in the team to mount a challenge
Motm wynter for me

[Grassbank]

St. Albans carried no goal threat for 120 minutes. Dan was a virtual spectator. We had numerous chances and half chances, but failed to take them.

I feel we gave it our all, but it was not quite enough. Losing Chin in the first half had a big impact on the match.

We fall in the play-offs yet again. The season, once more, counts for nothing. Not sure why clubs accept this joke arrangement. We might as well draw lots in August and save everybody the time and financial commitment.

[Dicky Dart]

First half: we were the better team. And when you’re the better team in the first half you MUST go in at halftime ahead. This is basically where we lost it. We allowed a shit corner to go through the bloke at the front post (Statham?) when it should have been cleared. Other than that our goal hadn’t been under threat.

Second half: we were crap. As I say, when you’re on top you need to make it count as you won’t always be on top. We lacked energy, lacked movement and resorted to long-ball shit that has been too prevalent in the second half of the season. St Albans were playing some nice stuff without really threatening. Given our penchant for letting in late goals I was becoming concerned. However, as the game reached its latter stages it looked like St Albans had also run out of steam.

Extra time: the introduction of Charles Sheringham gave us a kick up the arse. He was lively and I thought he would score the winner. St Albans had well and truly settled for penalties. if there was a free kick they made no effort to retrieve balls quickly. It was there for the taking for us. But for some reason we didn’t believe it. Too scared of losing.

Where do we go from here? Quite frankly I’d like the club/board to admit that it has been an unsuccessful season. But I don’t expect they’ll do that as it’ll mean admitting their own failings. And, like a lot of football clubs, it’s boardroom egos that count the most. Nevertheless, it hasn’t been a BAD season. Just not the great season that we were told over the tannoy.
I
Dowse: by his own admission he has one more season. I like that attitude. He’s not prepared to stick around failing - he wants promotion. As much as some board and some fans are happy just to reach the playoffs, Dowse wants to succeed. I believe he knows what we need (more vocal players, tacklers, scorers); will he have the bollocks to convince the board to back him?

To be honest a 2nd-place finish was a proba couple of places higher than I thought we’d finish. And I thought we’d have a much stronger 2nd half of the season. In the end it was the 10 wins and a draw out of 11 games from September to November that got us where we were. It’ll be a stronger division next year, so if we finish 20 points or more behind first place then we’re looking at 5th/6th/7th at best.

[Sleightly Deceptive]

I don’t think any one of us expected us to challenge for promotion when the season began. Dowse had unforced limitations and did incredibly well, overall, to get us to second place. His remit was ‘play offs’ and he achieved that. No complaints. The big test is from here on in. Beginning on Tuesday with his head buried in the ‘book of potential players’ to absolutely fill the void in this team. Central midfield and a couple of wingers plus a twenty-goal-a-season striker to accompany Bradbury up front. (Hoping he stays.) It’s gonna be as exciting a summer ahead as well as the subsequent ‘National League South West’ season! I’m looking forward to it already!

[Tony H]

I don’t think any one of us expected us to challenge for promotion when the season began. Dowse had unforced limitations and did incredibly well, overall, to get us to second place. His remit was ‘play offs’ and he achieved that. No complaints. The big test is from here on in. Beginning on Tuesday with his head buried in the ‘book of potential players’ to absolutely fill the void in this team. Central midfield and a couple of wingers plus a twenty-goal-a-season striker to accompany Bradbury up front. (Hoping he stays.) It’s gonna be as exciting a summer ahead as well as the subsequent ‘National League South West’ season! I’m looking forward to it already!

Bradbury is that 20 goal striker and his signing will be very good business. A commanding central midfielder is in order - chatted to Elliott Bradbrook at the game today and asked if he’d come out of retirement - he just smiled!

Otherwise too raw at the moment to comment on todays game, but might do tomorrow. Not very impressed with some of the knockers on here that just don’t know anything about how a club is run!

Spike - you’ve entertained me all season with your comments that are always spot on. Today’s is no exception!

Time to reflect on what has been a tough season. Good luck to Snorbans in their trip to play Oxford City next Sunday. For us, time to re-build.

Keep the faith! COYD’s.