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Sport

Jamie Coyle urges his Dartford players to focus on themselves and let fate take its course in last-day bid to seal National League South play-off place

By: Matthew Panting mpanting@thekmgroup.co.uk

Published: 00:00, 26 April 2019

Joint-boss Jamie Coyle has told his Dartford players to focus only on their result this weekend.

The Darts need to win at Oxford City in National League South, and hope two other results go their way.

Billericay and St Albans could both pip Darts to the final play-off spot, but they face testing final-day fixtures against Bath and champions Torquay respectively.

Dartford's Charlie Sheringham keeps the Braintree defence busy during Monday's 2-1 win Picture: Phil Lee

“It’s always a long shot when you’re looking at other results,” admitted Coyle. “You don’t want your fate to be in the hands of other teams but it’s worked out that way.

“Billericay have a tough game, and we’re looking at the St Albans result as well, but there’s no point worrying about them if we can’t go to Oxford and get the three points.

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“That’s the most important thing. If it takes us into a play-off spot then brilliant, if it doesn’t then it will be a real disappointment.

“It would be the worst thing not to win at Oxford but we’ve shown against Billericay that we can compete and be as good, if not better, than the top teams in this league.

“The reason why we’re looking at other results is because we haven’t had the consistency this year. We’ve shown that if we are consistent, get that desire and work ethic, then we’re a match for anyone.”

Dartford beat Billericay on Easter Monday to post their first win in seven games.

Coyle knows that dreadful run of form will be the main factor if they fail to reach the top seven.

“We can look back and say ‘what if’ here and ‘what if’ there but I think every team in the league will do that,” he explained.

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“The run we’ve been on at the end of the season, we can look at the injuries and use that as an excuse but the players that have gone out are good enough to get a better return than what we’ve got in the last six or seven games.

“At the start of the year if you said it would go to the last game to have a chance of getting into the play-offs would you have taken it? Potentially, yes, because we knew the league was a lot stronger this year.

“You can look back in the last few games and see we’ve given away some vital points. But we’ve got an opportunity still so we have to remain positive and concentrate on getting three points.”

Darts were beaten 4-1 at Oxford City in the FA Cup earlier in the season but Coyle claims his team are a different beast now.

“We owe them one, we went there in the FA Cup and got a pounding from them,” said Coyle.

“We’re a different, better team when we go there this time and we’ll have confidence from beating one of the best sides in the league in Billericay.

“We can only concentrate on our job and get the three points, then we’ll see at the end of the game if we’re fortunate enough to get a place in the play-offs.”

Darts will wait on the fitness of strikers Charlie Sheringham and Darren McQueen, who both played through the pain barrier against Billericay.

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