Break can do Eastbourne Borough power of good – now for the hard work

After last weekend’s aborted trip to Truro, the Sports have not kicked a ball in anger for a fortnight. But that may have worked to advantage for manager Adam Murray and his squad.

Just three days into the New Year, Murray took on a club in crisis and a playing squad in transition. No summer team-building, no pre-season preparation, next to no chance to work on your team shapes and your set-pieces. But – in a kind of mid-season close season – the manager has used his time fruitfully.

January results were unspectacular: one victory, one away draw, three single-goal defeats, at least one of which could be attributed to controversial refereeing decisions.

Could Eastbourne Boro and Worthing both achieve their National South aims?.

And the Truro saga is still unresolved, with the Cornish club’s pitch unplayable and alternative venues proving elusive.

“We were very disappointed that the Truro game was off, but we’ve come in nice and fresh for this week. We’ve been able to get the balance right between work and rest. We’ve got through lots of work, physical, technical, tactical. The boys have been doing double sessions, working in the gym in the afternoons.”

The Sports still have, if not a mountain to climb, certainly a steepish path to the sunlit uplands of fifth-from-bottom in the league table, and what would frankly be a sense of triumph in securing their National South status. It is a soap-opera season, which has lurched from fanfares and a touch of carnival, to edge-of-the-seat thriller. Will the good guys win?

“The biggest challenge from this point is that we’ve not got a lot of games left. We’ve two huge matches coming up (against Chelmsford City (Sat Feb 17) and Havant (Tue Feb 20) ) and we have a really strong focus in the group. It doesn’t really matter what’s going on around us. We have a target (of points and victories) that we need to hit.

“Looking again at our Bath City game (a 1-0 defeat), it was actually a really good away performance – but we’ve not taken our opportunities while Bath have taken one of theirs. If Bath are a play-off team, then we are not far away ourselves.”

Murray speaks with an impressive mix of purpose and focus, but proof will come only at 3pm tomorrow (Saturday) when third-placed Chelmsford City arrive at the Lane. Then, perhaps even more crucial, the Sports entertain Havant and Waterlooville, who are also scrapping for their National South lives.

Fifteen games and counting: that winter mini-break is history, and now Murray’s men must make their own history.