Pinchbeck United 1
Harborough Town 4
Youthful Pinchbeck United were handed a 4-1 home humbling by clinical Harborough Town as their tricky start to the new season continued.
Goals from Daniel Forbes (17), Ben Williams (43) and Finlay Gray (57 & 69) sank the Knights in the Uhlsport UCL Premier Division clash at the Sir Halley Stewart Playing Field on Saturday, making it three defeats from four games in all competitions so far this season.
Jordan Nuttell’s close-range finish on 35 minutes did level the scores at one point, but it was a bad day at the office for Pinchbeck.
Assistant boss Allan Ross, who was in charge with player/manager Ian Dunn unavailable, admitted that his side made “comical errors” at times.
But he refused to be too downbeat, insisting that it’ll take time for the new-look squad to gel and create their own identity.
“We need to stay on the same path, whether we’re winning or losing games,” said the number two. “The aim is to stick together and the game is the teacher for these young boys.
“We have to know that we’re going to be punished at times, but this is how these boys are going to grow.
“We’re going to have more games like this than we are victories this season. But it’s all about seeing if this team can take something from it and grow, while the lads develop their skills individually.
“At times I felt like we had little spells when we did alright, but then we made comical errors and we looked a bit of a shambles.
“In the first ten minutes of the second half we switched to a three at the back and we looked bright and they didn’t get out of their half.
“We needed the ball to fall for us. But it didn’t – and they scored from their first shot of the half. We didn’t deserve that.
“When it went 3-1 it would have been very negative to shut up shop and they got another one.
“We’ve not quite got an identity as a team yet, but that should come by Christmas when the lads have got 15 or 20 games under their belts.
“Every season that (manager) Ian Dunn and I have been together here, we’ve had a slow start as each pre-season we’ve mixed things up to try and get better.”
Pinchbeck started fairly brightly, with the returning Aaron Eyett racing down the left and putting in a dangerous cross that no team-mate was able to meet.
But Harborough came into the game and, after Ricky Lovelace had saved a header from Forbes, the same player soon opened the scoring with a coolly-taken half-volley from close range.
Aaron Preston to missed a huge chance to double the visitors’ lead when he screwed a gilt-edged chance wide from six yards out, then Ali Ashkir lashed over from distance as Pinchbeck were put firmly on the back foot.
However, they grabbed a leveller out of nowhere when Tony Edwards ran onto a long ball forward down the left and squared for Nuttell to finish well from the centre of the box.
Tall striker Nuttell was within a whisker of putting the Knights ahead when he sliding effort from close in was kicked off the line by away skipper Williams.
It proved a big moment, with the defender heading home Tony Bartlett’s corner on the brink of the half-time.
After the break a change in formation looked to steady the ship for the Knights, but they struggled to fashion a chance and were duly caught twice by swift Harborough breaks.
First, Gray found space on the left and saw his shot squirm through the hands of the unfortunate Lovelace and creep into the far corner.
Some 12 minutes later the left-back raced forward again and lashed home his second at the near post, with Lovelace powerless to resist.
The away side, who looked slick and full of creativity, had further chances to extend their lead further but settled for 4-1 in the end.
For Pinchbeck, it was another steep learning curve and further proof that the class of 2019 will find it very tough to emulate the success of last season’s expensively assembled squad.
But Ross is adamant that building the new-look squad up and possessing a squad that will have the club’s values at heart is a challenge that he and Dunn are relishing.
Ross added: “I feel like, as a coach, I’m going back my roots (with this team). These young boys are the next generation and I’m fed up of trying to ‘buy a player’.
“You speak to players these days and all the care about is the pound note, not what the club is about and what its values are.
“The DNA of this team will be to give 100 per cent and everything else will follow. We haven’t got the quality that we’ve had here in recent years, however we feel that it hasn’t cost us much to lose a game of football!
“We’re trying to build personalities and preach that your best is good enough and the rest will follow.
“We feel that, certainly last season, lads came here for the wrong reasons. They didn’t come because we’d had success on the pitch, they came here purely because they were going to get paid well.
“What we’ve got now is a bunch of boys that we are trying to bring through. We’ve got to strip it right back to basics. I’m not saying we’ll be in the top half of the table by Christmas, but we’ll be harder to beat.
“We need to lick our wounds and start again. Ian and I could have quite easily walked away over the summer because we’ve no longer got the budget we’ve had.
“But we’re now trying to build this football club again on and off the field. We know that we’re going to be hit for four and five by the better teams this year.
“The plan is to build a team over the next two or three years with players we’ve developed, not those that we’ve had to buy in.”
Knights: Lovelace, Gordon (Dementer 70), Eyes, Worthington, Forth, Newman, Edwards (Gaukroger 70), Bishop, Maltby, Nuttell (Kacirek 70), Eyett. Not used: Ross.
Attendance: 68.
Sponsors’ MOTM: Aaron Eyett.
