Maidstone United boss John Still won't give up on this season
Published: 00:00, 08 March 2019
Maidstone's survival prospects look slim but John Still isn't ready to throw in the towel.
United are 13 points from safety going into Saturday's home game against relegation rivals Havant.
It's more than six months since their sole league win at the Gallagher but they have to deliver this weekend.
The Havant clash is followed by a trip to play-off contenders Eastleigh on Tuesday night.
Stones boss Still said: "It’s not possible to accept we’re going down because this is football.
"We've got 11 games left and my target is 33 points and if we lose the next game it’ll be 30 points.
"Because this is football, we could have an unbelievable run and win seven or eight and someone could have an unbelievably bad run and lose seven or eight.
"You can never say we're down, not in a million years.
"We have to get on the road of looking where the changes may be for next season, regardless of what league we’re in, and we have started that.
"Whatever league we’re in, we need to change and that’s where a load of hard work needs to go in."
Maidstone's 5-0 defeat at Solihull last weekend has helped Still make up his mind on players.
All four first-half goals were avoidable, with United punished from two long throws, a free-kick and a penalty.
Maidstone were more involved in the second half but only because Solihull eased off before adding an injury-time fifth.
Still said: "I'm going to state the obvious here - Solihull were much better than us.
"It's a team that's been together a long time and they were a lot better than us but four goals came from restarts.
"We could have been poor but don't concede from restarts that we'd worked our socks off on in training on Friday.
"That tells me a little bit about can people work with discipline?
"We all get disappointment, it's how you deal with the disappointment.
"I'm lucky because I'm old and I've seen it and done it and I always say the same, disappointment makes the weak weaker and the strong stronger.
"If I look at something that's disappointing it becomes a plus because it's showing me who can come on the journey. It's actually done me a favour."
Aron Davies (ankle) and Jake Cassidy (quad) joined Maidstone's injury list last weekend but will hopefully be fit.
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Craig Tucker