Taylor praises Rocks (11.11.05)

MAIDENHEAD United manager Carl Taylor’s words must have been ringing in his ears on Tuesday night, as his side suffered an embarrassing 8-1 thrashing away to Bognor Regis Town.
Talking in last week’s Advertiser, the York Road boss said: “Bognor are the sort of team where, if you catch them on the wrong day, you get beaten five or six nil. We just hope we don’t catch them on one of those days.”
Yesterday (Thursday) he jokingly claimed his side had over-achieved in leaking eight, but refused to be too hard on his players, instead choosing to pay Bognor their dues.
He said: “I could make any number of excuses but I think that would be disrespectful to Bognor Regis. Why can’t people be honest? Bognor Regis absolutely battered us.
“They were fantastic. That’s it.
“Everything they tried worked. The goals and shots were raining in. They were excellent on the night. All credit to them.
“Nothing we tried worked. Every player was poor, apart from the front two. They both had good games and did what I expected of them.
“They’re developing a pretty good partnership. But everyone else had an off night.
“Looking for positives, if you’re going to lose it’s one of the best results you could have.
“It’s a reminder to the players of what can happen when they don’t perform at this level.
“They’ve only let me down once and they got battered for it.
“Another positive is that they could have beaten us 12-0. But we’ll come back even stronger. I will, and my players will.
“If anyone thinks this is the start of our demise they can just go and give the bookies their money. I’m that confident.”
Tuesday night’s thumping was made all the more eye-popping by Saturday’s terrific win at Dorchester Town.
Taylor admitted the two games were chalk and cheese, saying: “We were fantastic on Saturday.
“We were as good on Saturday as we were bad on Tuesday. But I think it took a bit out of us.”
Dorchester manager Mark Morris was less flattering, blaming his side’s defeat on ‘one of the worst performances I have been associated with since I have been here’.
However, he begrudgingly admitted United had earned their win, saying: “Maidenhead were first to every ball and when they passed the ball we were nowhere near them.”
Morris was surprised Scott Tarr avoided a red card when he brought down Matt Groves to concede the penalty, but did not blame his side’s defeat on the incident, saying: “The referee's made one bad decision. If my team had just made one then it might have been a talking point, but we just weren’t at the races.”
United entertain St Albans City at York Road tomorrow (Saturday).
“We’re at the bottom, so they’re all tough for us, but it’s going to be tough for them as well.
“Everyone will see on Saturday that we’re no pushovers.”

Southern League Division 1 West side Beaconsfield Sycob overcame Burnham on Monday night in the Berks & Bucks Cup to set up a quarter-final tie at home to Maidenhead United in January.