SINCE Sky Sports decided to screen live coverage of our home match with Dagenham on Monday, October 13, we have been concerned at the prospect of having to play in the LDV Vans Trophy the following night and then at Chester on the Saturday.

Prior to the draw, the Football League said they would allow us to switch the LDV Vans Trophy tie to the Wednesday. We have now been drawn at home to Exeter in the competition and, for two weeks after the scheduled date, there are no Conference midweek games. So we are now hopeful that the Football League and the Conference will see sense and allow us to put our match against Exeter back a week. Otherwise, it will mean us having to play three important matches in six days.

We are pleased with our draw in the competition, particularly with it being at home. We cannot underestimate Exeter and, although they have got major financial problems, they have had some good home results and thrashed Forest Green away 5-2 on Saturday.

For the visit of Scarborough on Saturday we had another high attendance, which caused a few problems that the club and the supporters could learn from.

It can be difficult when you suddenly start to get big crowds. I think that people have to accept that with the ground in the condition it is, they must try to arrive earlier. We then had a problem with people not sitting in the blocks which they had been given tickets for. We would like to appeal to supporters to get to the ground 15 minutes earlier than they would normally do to help ensure a freer flow of people coming through the turnstiles.

At 2.45pm on Saturday, the chief steward thought that the queues were manageable and that we could get everybody into the ground on time. At five to three, however, after it was decided that the match would definitely start at 3pm, I am told there was a big surge of people coming from the direction of the market and it was then too late to delay the kick-off.

In our next two matches, against Burton and Telford, we will have the added interest of coming up against several familiar faces. Burton, of course, have Ian Wright, who was a good skipper for us, and it will be interesting to see how Ian fares. Telford have John Grant, who never quite fulfilled his true potential with us, and Matt Clarke, who we were sorry to see depart.