Maybe our league position at the moment is a bit false - Hinshelwood

Worthing’s boss admits there may have been too much hype about Worthing’s chances of success in the Bostik League Premier Division this season.

The team sit third in the table but were held to a 1-1 draw at home to Leatherhead on Saturday and have collected just five points from four home games this season.

Asked about his team being among the promotion candidates this year, Hinshelwood said: “I wouldn’t say that with the way we are playing, if I’m being honest.

“Maybe our league position at the moment is a bit false. Look at the teams we’ve played against – no disrespect to them but the majority are in the bottom half of the table.

“We’re still young, we’ll still get better and be progressive but I wouldn’t say we’re title contenders or anything like that, especially with the way we’ve performed at home although our away form has been good.

“I was under no illusions we would be title contenders anyway. I think maybe the hype has gone a little bit crazy from how we performed in the last few months and probably rightly so, with the way this team performed for a long period of time.

“However there’s loads of room to improve.”

After Saturday’s draw, Hinshelwood was surprised by the reaction of some fans and wants supporters to be patient with his young team.

He said: “I read some things like fans saying ‘keep the faith’ and stuff like that after we drew on Saturday.

“But we’ve lost only one game in our first 11, so maybe the hype and everything has gone a bit crazy.

“They’re normally the type of messages I get and read when the club is languishing in the lower regions of the league.

“But we’re third in the league, four points off the top and have won three cup games. That’s with a young group and with a playing budget that’s not in the top regions of the league.

“Supporters – and rightly so – can have their say but what I’ll say is maybe we have got to look at our expectations a little bit. Don’t get me wrong, in the dressing room we have high expectations and we always want to improve. But our average age is 22. With that, there’s going to be an element of inconsistency.”

Hinshelwood feels several clubs will be challenging for the top five positions this season but is not setting a target for his side.

He said: “It’s such a tight league. Enfield scored six at the weekend but that’s a rarity. The majority of our games this year have all been quite tight. It’s a tough league, there’s no real stand-out team from what I’ve seen so far.

“There’s lots of very good teams, nothing is going to be handed to you and the ability level throughout the league is very similar.”