Castle pleased to get back to winning ways

MANAGER Steve Castle was pleased to see his side get back to winning ways against Weymouth on Saturday but admitted the performance was well below-par.

Goals from Godfrey Poku and Drew Roberts helped City come from behind to beat the crisis club but Castle was left frustrated by the fact that his side had played a lot better against Newport and come away empty handed.

"This is football and it's a results business," said Castle, "but for us we had to endure that and let's be honest we enjoyed the Newport game. Now that sounds very contradictory as we got three points today and no points against Newport but as a football purist, not that I am, you just think you'd rather watch them getting a 1-0 deficit against Newport because we played so much better, there was so much more team work there.

"We had too much time on the ball and it flummoxed us to be perfectly honest."

Despite being disappointed by the performance the City chief was keen not to overlook the fact that his side had actually won.

"I'm very aware of not bursting the bubble totally because I've said to them after the Newport game well done but we've got to win and we've done that," said Castle, "but the icing on the cake would be to finish off with a convincing performance and that's what I think we were all expecting and hoping for."

Justin Clayton returned to the City starting XI on Saturday having missed Wednesday's curtailed trip to Lewes and the giant defender looked assured alongside skipper Ryan Frater.

"Justin missed Wednesday because his parent club, Southend United, wouldn't let him out which was fully respectable," said Castle. "He's come in, we had to let the old boy down Mr Peters but he was quite glad that Justin was there, and he's done fantastic."

When asked whether Clayton had officially left Southend United the City boss said: "I couldn't answer the question on that one. He's non-contract; he's signed for both of us so in effect he can go back and he plays his reserve games down there but with the threat of administration down there they may well want him back permanently. But as I say he's non-contract and we're in different leagues so it shouldn't have any effect."

Another youngster, Poku, continued to impress in midfield and capped his performance off with his first goal for the club.

"There's so much honesty about his game which is absolutely fantastic," continued Castle.

"He deserves to stay in, obviously we've dropped Luke Thurlbourne who I thought was very disappointing on Wednesday and Godfrey's got his chance and was arguably better than James Fisher.

"He keeps the ball, he stays behind the ball and he gets his shots away every so often and he looks like a good find that we can build on."

City physio Zac Chandler looks like being a busy man over the coming weeks as a number of players look to shake off knocks.

Winger David Galbraith has injured his calf, Solomon Shields is nursing a hamstring strain, James Quilter picked up a nasty knock to his shoulder against Lewes and Adam Everitt sustained a groin injury on Saturday.

"David's done his calf again," revealed Castle. "It doesn't seem as if we can get 90 minutes of football out of him. We'll see, it's very early to tell on that one."

Talking about Quilter's shoulder injury the City boss said: "He thought he'd cracked a bone in his shoulder. He basically anti-inflammatory'd himself up and got out there which was testament to himself.

"I'm not going to give him excuses but he certainly wasn't at the races and maybe that had a little bit of an impact on it, I don't know."

The news regarding Shields is a little more positive with Castle hoping to have the influential midfielder back in contention for Saturday's trip to Basingstoke.

"I think he'll be okay," explained Castle. "If not next week, it'll be the week after. It wasn't a pull as such it was a twinge and the signs are at the moment that everything is on course for hopefully making him fit for selection for next week.