Upottery finding it tough at the top

Upottery suffered a fourth defeat in five Macron League top flight games when beaten by the odd goal in five at Okehampton Argyle.

It’s a measure of just how far the villagers have come in recent years when you consider that two short seasons ago Upottery were playing their football at the third tier of Devon and Exeter League football whilst Argyle were locking horns with the bug guns in the South West Peninsula League.

The latest defeat was typical of the ‘near-things;’ that have been the early season nemesis for Dan Prettejohn and his team.

The Upottery boss said: “We are simply not getting any luck right now. Okehampton told us that had we played the week before they’d have been struggling as they had nine missing and yet a week later – for us- they are at full strength!

“We did try a new formation in this game and that was without having too much time to work on it on the training ground.

“That said, the early signs for me are that it will work. What seems to be happening so far in terms of our Macron League Premier Division baptism of fire is that we are not getting out classed we just don’t seem to be getting the rub of the green .”

The Upottery boss continued: “But don’t think for one minute we are going to sulk and make excuses. Quite the opposite, we worked hard to get where we are today and are not about to surrender that! We will prepare for the next game, which takes us to Beer, and look to make sure that the Fishermen experience a difficult afternoon.

“I have heard whispers that we are considered to be ‘out of our depth’, but cheap jibes like that will be used to spur us on to prove that we are here with the big boys on merit.”