Match Report
National League South
Dartford
Kieran Murtagh 44, 65, Marcus Dinanga 79
St Albans City
Shaun Jeffers 54
Allinson: Cut the 'horrendous mistakes' out and Saints will make the play-offs
Shaun Jeffers of St Albans City scored his 26th National League South goal this season against Dartford. - Credit: DANNY LOO PHOTOGRAPHY
Ian Allinson still believes St Albans City can make the National League South play-offs but they have to cut on the "horrendous mistakes" first.
Saints' 3-1 defeat at play-off bound Dartford leaves Allinson's men in ninth, four points behind Havant & Waterlooville in the race for the seventh and final play-off position.
Two of those goals did not please the City boss but even with two of their remaining games against sides above them in the table, Allinson is confident in his players' ability.
He said: "These are three massive games now and I really truly believe that if we win all three games, which we are capable of doing, we'll get in the play-offs.
"There’s no pressure on us. The only pressure is winning those three games but we know we have to do that.
"We have to train hard and then beat Dorking on Saturday.
"We have got a squad that is good enough, we just have to stop the silly little mistakes that have been costing us."
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The first of the daft goals conceded came a minute before half-time with the second 11 minutes after Shaun Jeffers had equalised.
That, according to Allinson, was the second half of the season in a nutshell.
He said: "At times over the last eight or nine games we have played exceptionally well.
"We’ve come to a team who are third in the league and for long spells, we took the game to them.
"But again, we have given poor goals away and that is the story of the second half of our season.
"We’ve not been good enough in our own box and we have made two horrendous mistakes, people haven’t done their jobs properly. It’s as simple as that.
"We had worked so hard to keep it at 0-0 and then we concede a crazy goal in the 44th minute.
"It is hard to pick the players up but I needed to tell them some home truths about what we weren’t doing correctly.
"We had to get on the front foot but the players were great in the second half. For 20 minutes we were outstanding.
"But then we gave a terrible second goal away and we were back on the back foot.
"Every single week we have to chase games and it is something we haven’t been good at this season."
