Tony Burman answered Dartford's critics in a frank post-match interview on Saturday night.

Darts had just drawn 1-1 with title rivals Braintree to stay top of National League South when the manager came out to speak to the media at Princes Park.

Burman declared himself happy with a point before looking at the bigger picture of the season so far.

He said: "We're top after 22 games and we would have taken that in August.

"People are saying we've dipped in this and dipped in that but in some of the games we've lost, we've just been a bit unfortunate.

"We've got a real good squad. I've strengthened in depth, which is what everyone says, and then you get criticised for not playing certain people.

"At the end of it, we've got a good football club here. We've got good people behind it who try their best to make it all work. We've got a good squad and good people in that changing-room as well.

"There's a long way to go before anything's settled. On and off the field, let's get behind the guys, get behind the club and let's see where it takes us.

"There's always criticism and I accept that. The manager always gets criticism but when people start to criticise other people, who are trying their best, probably for nothing, within the club, it always seems like there's a negative element about certain people around the place.

"All we want to do is do our best for the football club. You can't win every single game. You can't play perfect every single game but you can work hard. If you say that my sides don't work hard, you're wrong.

"We've won a lot of games, we've lost some games and in those games we've still worked hard. We've had a couple of poor performances but at other times it's just been a bit unfortunate."

Alfie Pavey started on the bench again, the 15-goal striker having recently been hospitalised with a chest infection.

Burman said: "It's well-publicised that Alfie's had some breathing problems over the last few weeks, which has hampered him when the weather's got cold.

"He's asthmatic and you have to manage that. I know all about being asthmatic because that's what I suffer from myself. There's no worse feeling than not being able to breathe.

"We've had to calm that down a little bit and wait for him to get ready and better. Although he tells me he's better, that's a 21-year-old for you and I have to make the decision whether he starts or he doesn't.

"One of the things we've had to do in the last three games is play one up. No-one's done anything wrong, it's just that I've chosen Danny Mills and I think I'm justified in doing that."

Burman also explained why midfielder Lee Noble didn't feature in the game.

"When I got here, he was out doing the warm-up," he said. "He's come through the warm-up on his own and I decided to put him on the bench. When he did the warm-up with the players, he's come back in and his calf stiffened up so we had a little problem there.

"Before people say 'why haven't we got Nobes on there?' unfortunately I've made the decision, yet again, to say 'no, he's not going on' because he's told me it has stiffened up a little bit. We had a sub but we couldn't use him but that was at 2.55pm so there was nothing we could do about it."

The home crowd was quiet for much of the game - so does Burman want more noise from the terraces?

"Possibly," he said. "But they've supported us really well, home and away.

"They want us to get that gap between everyone. People are saying the league's not as good as it was and all these comments come into it but let's see where the results take us.

"Hopefully we can get the few wins together we need but nothing happens in December, nothing happens in January. You've got to keep up there among the pack.

"If we make a gap, great, but it just doesn't work like that sometimes."