Woodman Calls for Bromley to “stick together” After Three Consecutive Defeats

Bromley Head Coach, Andy Woodman has called for his team to “stick together” after three consecutive defeats.

Goals from Jayden Stockley and Myles Hippolyte saw Bromley suffer a 2-0 defeat at home to AFC Wimbledon, which condemned them to three consecutive defeats for the first time since October 2022, when they were in the National League at that point.

Woodman post-match explained to BFC TV that he had addressed preventing crosses at source with the players yet that aspect was their undoing for their first conceded goal, as Stockley was able to nod in from James Tilley’s deep cross on the right flank.

“We spoke about stopping the cross at source. We didn’t do that, ball comes in. We came out of the box and we’re not marking it. It’s a free header.

“Could argue the goalkeeper could do better with it as well, but you know, if you’re making mistakes like that early on in the game, or certainly in the game, the first one’s very important.”

AFC Wimbledon’s second goal came on a quick breakaway 67th-minute attack as Stockley turned playmaker with a cross, which was slotted in by Hippolyte when Bromley had been in attacking control at that point, which led Woodman urging his team to unite and don’t give up belief.

“Yeah, you never need a second, we’re not going to tell you that. It’s just how it’s going for us at the moment. I’m not going to stand here and say, you know, we’re having bad luck because we’re not. We’re not taking control of the game ourselves and doing what we need to do.

“We’ve just got to stick together now and really make sure that we don’t lose faith and don’t lose confidence.”

Woodman also repeated his point from his post-match interview with UK broadcaster, Sky Sports about his team being their own worst enemy and making errors which leave them on the back foot.

“Well to be fair, I think we were the masters of our own downfall a little bit, you know. We were having a go, we were huffing and puffing, but we’re just making errors.

“You can start chasing the game and you know, I knew the lads are having a go and they’re giving it everything, but we just wasn’t good enough. you know, and we need to be better at the final third.

“We need to have more quality up there, we need to keep the pressure on the opposition which we’re not doing at the moment, and it’s very I’m, I’m, I’m probably un Bromley like at the moment.”

Both teams produced nine shots across the match of which Bromley converted just two onto target, whilst the Dons scored from two of their four shots on target, which left Woodman feeling that small differences settled the South London derby.

“I mean I can’t recall them having loads of shots on goal throughout the game. That said nor did we. It was going to be margins or a mistake or something like that sort of split the teams early doors, because we’re both on the back of a tricky little run.

“I just said to the players in there, ‘Look we’ve got to, we’ve got to grow up quickly now because we can’t keep coming in here and saying we were unlucky with this or we didn’t get that right.

“It’s not acceptable, you know, with professional footballers, I’m a professional manager. And we need to make sure that we, you know, start turning the corner and start getting some clean sheets in the building.”

Bromley however experienced frustration in terms of fitness as goalkeeper, Shamal George and left-back, Deon Woodman went off injured in the first half, followed by Richard Taylor with suspected cramp just before the hour mark.

Woodman however iterated that whilst there is an “excuse culture” in his squad, there is no performance excuses in cases of injury, as he called for the lads to show their unity and keep grafting if want to turn their recent dip in form around.

“Yeah, they didn’t help, you know, they didn’t help, but that happens, I can’t, I always say that I’ve got an excuse culture here with these players. So I can’t let that be an excuse, that’s what we got to squad for.

“You know it does throw you out a little bit as you get to the latter stages of the game. You know, you want to maybe bring two up top, or you want to do something else and you just can’t, because you’ve done your subs.

“You know, we’ve got to make sure that we just really all stick together. You know, we knew it was going to be tough, we know it’s going to be a bumpy road. But what we’ve got to do is just keep believing and keep working.

“And I said to the guys in there, we’ve got to keep grafting on the training ground. And guess what, it will fall for us, I’m sure it will.”

With just two shots on target in each of Bromley’s last three matches, Woodman feels that his team lack street wisdom at League One level, hence why they are currently sat 21st in the table and has urged his team to add more street-wise quality to their play.

“I felt our quality in the final bit was just not there. You know, we just took an extra touch, put a cross in, or we took it pretty in too early. You know, we’re huffing and puffing.

“I just felt they were a little bit more street-wise, and I saw it over the pitch, you know, just a little nudge to put us off balance, or a little clever foul, or you know, just the way they went about their business was way more street wise than we are. And we need to get that in our game quickly.”

With a trip to Blackpool coming up on Saturday 12 September, Woodman made it clear that there would be no rest day but hinted at more squad rotation at Bloomfield Road, with Jodi Jones still awaiting his debut following deadline-day move from Notts County.

“Well, we come in tomorrow and we go again and we graft and graft and graft. And you know, there’s players that have not made the squad tonight. They’ll be ready enough for putting their names down on a shirt and we have to keep looking for a team that’s going to go out there and be, you know, it has to be fullness, fullness and get us a result.

“And that’s what we’re going to have to keep trying to do.”

Looking ahead to the trip to the Tangerines, Woodman made it clear that it won’t be easy but has urged the club to keep embracing this season, whilst working to turn their form around.

“Yeah I mean they don’t get any easier today. We’ve got tough games coming up, but let’s remind ourselves, we wanted to be in this league so we’ve got to embrace it and we’ve got to expect that it’s going to be tough and we’ve got to make sure that we overcome it.”