South Shields 'must improve' after Spennymoor Town defeat
South Shields fell to a 2-0 home defeat against National League North rivals Spennymoor Town on Monday.
Elliott Dickman believes South Shields must improve at both ends of the pitch after they suffered a 2-0 defeat against Spennymoor Town in their final home game of the National League North season.
After making a promising start to the game, the Mariners found themselves behind just after the quarter-hour mark as an inability to clear the ball from a dangerous position led the the visitors grabbing the opening goal of the game. As the ball bobbled around on the edge of the home area, the Moors seized possession and that led to former Blyth Spartans winger Corey McKeown expertly stroking the ball beyond Kyle Seymour and inside his far post.
Top goalscorer Paul Blackett had the Mariners best opportunities as he fired a shot wide just before the hour-mark before he was denied by a stunning save from visitors keeper Brad James as the former Middlesbrough stopper somehow kept out a close-range header. James got his reward just over 15 minutes later when his side doubled their lead and secured all three points as former South Shields loan signing Aidan Rutledge converted from the penalty spot after he had been upended by Mariners keeper Seymour.
He told The Gazette: “I’m not taking anything away from Spennymoor because they were well organised, as most teams are when they come to us. We have to find that little bit of spark and that little bit of magic. Their keeper has made an unbelievable save to deny Paul Blackett from close range, we tried a few long-range efforts and there were balls into the box. Ultimately, they’ve defended well and we haven’t done that, not just today but over the course of the season. Their goals have come from us making mistakes and that’s where we need to improve.”
“We’ve had fantastic support from the club”
The Mariners will round off their season with a visit to Marine on Saturday afternoon and a fifteenth placed finish is the best possible scenario that can come out of their trip to Merseyside. However, a defeat against the National League North’s other Mariners could see South Shields end the campaign just three places above the relegation zone if results elsewhere go against them. Despite what can be viewed as an underwhelming season, Dickman stressed he would not change anything about the last nine months and looked ahead to bring an improvement out of his players when the new season gets underway in August.
He said: “I’ve just said to the players that I wouldn’t change anything over the course of the season. We’ve had fantastic support from the club, Geoff (Thompson, South Shields owner) has been brilliant in a number of ways and obviously it’s a little bit different to how it’s been in the past in some respects. I want to be with this group of lads and I want them to understand how important they are for what we want to achieve here. I’m gutted for us all because we work so hard to try and win games but it’s not easy and it wasn’t easy today.
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