Graham Kemp has resigned as manager of Dorchester Town after just four months in the job.
Tuesday night’s 2-1 defeat at Chippenham Town proved to be the final straw for the beleaguered boss, who hadn’t seen his side win in the league since 22nd November. In fact they had only picked up one single point from their last eight league games, and had conceeded 23 goals during that spell.
Kemp leaves the Magpies 21st in the table – 2 points adrift of safety but crucially with a game in hand. Stuart Heath and Nick Crittenden will take temporary charge of the side whilst the search for a new boss goes on, and they will need to hit the ground running on Saturday when they face their biggest game of the season at home to 22nd placed Banbury United.
Like Dorchester, the Puritans are in pretty poor form – managing just one win in their last eleven games, but they are at least beggining to grind out a few draws. And one of their four wins this season was against the Magpies.
The two sides are level on 19 points from 26 games, but the Magpies have a superior goal difference. Defeat for either side on Saturday could leave them five points adrift of safety, whilst a win could see them climb out of the bottom 3.
It promises to be a tense and nervy afternoon at the Avenue, and the Magpies will have to be up for the fight. They need to start picking up some wins sooner or later, particularly against the sides around them at the foot of the table.
Victory on Saturday is even more important for Dorchester considering they have two tough trips to two play-off contenders after that. Defeat would be a major blow to their hopes of staying up.
Nick Crittenden has sent out a rallying cry to the Magpies faithfull on Twitter appealing for everyone to get behind the management and the team on Saturday. The home crowd can play their part on a big game like this, so hopefully they see a big turnout.
Whilst Kemp was tendering his resignation, Weymouth fell to their first home defeat of the season against Paulton Rovers on Tuesday evening.
The visitors took the lead in just the first minute to leave Weymouth with a mountain to climb. And despite piling on the pressure, the Terras were unable to force an equaliser, and two events before half time took the wind out of their sails.
First, Stewart Yetton took a nasty elbow to the head which left him with a nasty cut above the eye, and saw him leave the pitch looking a little groggy. Fingers crossed he’ll be ok to play again on Saturday.
Then as frustrations began to boil over, Ashley Wells went in needlessly two footed and saw a straight red card. He could have no complaints, it was a rush of blood and a stupid tackle, but it means he’ll now miss three games further down the line – including the trip to Poole.
Two quickfire goals early in the second half effectively finished the game off, before Paulton were then reduced to ten men themselves. And within minutes Chris Shephard got the Terras on the scoresheet, to give the home fans hope of a fightback.
It was good while it lasted, but another defensive lapse allowed the visitors to make it four, and mean Steve Colwell’s injury time goal was no more than a consolation.
A bad night for the Terras was compounded by news that Poole Town had edged out bottom club Burnham 1-0 to close the gap at the top of the table back to just one point.
No denying it was a pretty bad night for Weymouth, but over a 46 game campaign it’s inevitable that you will get games like that. What matters now is how the Terras respond to this minor setback. There’s no need to panic, they’re still top of the league, but they need to bounce back quickly when they travel to 12th placed Slough Town on Saturday.
Weymouth defeated them 3-2 earlier in the season, and on the day it could have been 5 or 6 had Weymouth taken their chances. They’ll need to do so on Saturday.
Poole Town also have a crucial game on Saturday, as they welcome 4th in the table Redditch United to Tatnam.
The Birmingham based outfit have surprised many people this season and find themselves just 5 and 6 points off the top two, but they have played 3 and 4 games more than Weymouth and Poole. However a victory at Tatnam would really set the cat amongst the pigeions, and they’ll go into the game full of confidence having picked up 13 points from their last five games.
It’s a massive weekend for all three Dorset clubs in the Southern Premier League, and all three are under pressure to pick up victories on Saturday. Defeats would not be season ending, but they’d be almighty blows.
James Spring
