Another sunny day down at the Cope, with a mood to match on at least two of the pitches.  Congrats to the 5's on another strong performance and the 3's on an efficient performance that saw them through to the next round of the cup.  From the away sides, it was good to see the 1's get off the mark, although you could tell from Dom's text to me that they were frustrated not to grab all 3 points, although rightly giving praise to a strong Lyonians side.  The 2's also gave a good account of themselves but were unable to overcome Wokingians 1st XI in the cup, so after 2 cup defeats next week a chance to concentrate on the league then!  And well done to the 6's and 7's both of whom scored 5 trimes away to set up emphatic victories.

However, this week I want to use my column to highlight a concern and something that I want to cut out from our club at all levels, and that is some of the negativity from some players that I witnessed in a couple of our games yeaterday.  We will at some time all have bad games either individually or collectively as a team.  At those times we will show our true character.  The best way to do that is to rally round each other and encourage as best as possible and try and work through the bad time together.  Unfortunately what I saw yesterday from a minority of people  were players who weren't performing brilliantly themselves, but as soon as a fellow team-mate made a mistake then taking the opportunity to verbally lay into them and shatter that players confidence further.  We all make mistakes, and lets face it if we didn't we would be gracing some premiership stadium rather than a field in Beckenham, and I am all for constructive criticism which helps to improve a player and also a gee up call when it is given in the right spirit.  An example I can give from own playing days involves a current captain of this club, who was playing left back that day.  We gave away a soft goal, and he let me know in no uncertain terms that I should have come and claimed the ball, but importantly because he knew I was capable of doing so...and he was right.  After that I came and claimed everything I could, because I knew what he had said was true - I needed the wake up call and certainly got that, but in a way that inspired rather than destroyed me.  There is a fine line between constructive criticism and having a go at someone, and yesterday there were a few players that went way over that line and destroyed their team-mates confidence, and what made it worse was that those players were actually playing no better themselves.  So, please think about the consequences of your actions - yes, sometimes we all need a wake up call or to have the error of our ways pointed out to us, but please let us do it in a way that has a positive result, rather than destrying the confidence of a team-mate and in the process destroying the morale of the team.  If we all take that on board, we have the potential to turn anything round, and who knows perhaps next week we will be focussing on the good things again.

Steve Martin-Lawrence, Chairman