The Bostik Friday Interview: The Ballad of Neal Simmons

Back in the summer we asked supporters from each of our Bostik League clubs to predict the final tables for the season, and those from the North Division looked into the future and decided that there would be success for Canvey Island, AFC Hornchurch and Maldon and Tiptree. They placed Dereham Town in thirteenth place, and that was perhaps rather unsurprising, given that the Magpies had ended the last campaign in eighteenth- but if you take a look at the table today, with more than a third of the season gone, you might think it a rather pessimistic view.

The town of Dereham in Norfolk has long been overshadowed by its neighbour, the cathedral city of Norwich, in both economic and footballing terms. That’s still the case today- after all, it is only just over four years since Town were promoted from County League level for the very first time- but perhaps the time is approaching when Dereham will be associated with football not just for providing the birthplace of Millwall legend Harry Cripps, but for the success of its own local side. The Magpies sit top of the table, and have produced a string of excellent performances which have included victories over this season’s other surprise package, Heybridge Swifts, AFC Hornchurch and Bury Town. We caught up with the architect of that success, manager Neal Simmons, to ask what he was doing right!

You’re four months into your first ever season as a manager, and you’re top of the league! How does that feel?

It feels good, there’s no doubt about that. I was nine years Matt Henman’s Assistant and over the last few years I’d fairly regularly taken the team on my own due to holiday and work commitments, so it wasn’t a shock, but it’s really pleasing how well we’ve done. The teams in this league are really well matched, however, and there’s never likely to be more than a goal or two between them, so I’m not getting ahead of myself. We might be top but there’s not a huge difference between us and the other teams so I’m not sitting here thinking “we’ve cracked it.” There’s a long way to go, but we’ve got a good spirit and hopefully we can keep it going.

Is it somewhat unexpected, though? Last season you were eighteenth, and now you’re top- that’s a bit of a jump. What changed?

I got a little lucky. Some players became available who Matt and I had been trying to sign for years- Jamie Forshaw from Lowestoft Town, for example, had been a target for four or five years- so perhaps all my ducks landed in a row. I need to give Matt a lot of the credit; we both spent a lot of time towards the end of last season trying different things, talking to different people, trying to plan for this season. Keeper Elliot Pride became available and needed a new challenge, I had to bring in two new centre halves as ours left at the end of last season which forced my hand a little, some of the younger boys who had played for the team for a couple of seasons have now got the experience to back up their ability, and the Academy has given me the resources to have some strength in depth. And having a good start helped, we’ve built momentum.

It’s quite unique at our level that a club has an academy. How is that going- and are you seeing regular progression between that and the first team?

It’s fantastic. We have two full years, forty students- twenty in each year- and we’re linked to the local High School, but all of the learning facilities are at the club and as such they’re on site most of the time. The progression is good, but the difficulty is that when we do well, as we have over the last few weeks, we’re putting lots of pressure on very young shoulders so I have to manage that carefully.

Aldiss Park, home of Dereham Town

But all in all, it’s a godsend. When we have a midweek game at Canvey, for example, and people are struggling to get time away from work, I have a ready-made resource with which I can plug the gaps with quality- and when the Academy players have been called on they’ve all done well. It’s giving them valuable experience as they develop their football careers.

How many of the Academy boys are regularly in your squad on a matchday?

Regularly three or four, but it can be as many as five or six on some occasions. We can’t play too many of them at a time- Matt and I tried it as an experiment last year and in the second half of the season some of them struggled, as I suppose you’d expect in this league- so we take it sensibly, give them thirty minutes here and there, and they are all coming along very well.

Are there any particular prospects?

I’m not going to answer that one. They’re too young to have me singling them out, and I’m not going to heap expectation on their shoulders as it wouldn’t be fair. People develop at different speeds; we’ve a number of First Years who are progressing really well, and a collection of the Second Years doing brilliantly, but that brings its own problems. A number of the Second Years are signing up to scholarships in the USA for next year- eight went last season, this season we expect in excess of ten to go, and that means that in the long term they won’t be here so I have to look at bringing on the First Years to get them ready for the first team squad. It takes a lot of planning, but it’s a good reason to have to do it.

Back to this season, then. What targets did you set for the team?

Absolutely none! We just want the club to be a place where everyone is happy, where we get to enjoy our football. There were moments last season, towards the end of the campaign, where it wasn’t too much fun and we wanted that to change; just to be positive and see where that took us. So far the journey has been lovely!

In pre-season you talked about the struggle to attract people through the gates, about the need to make sure that the experience was worth the eight pounds that you charged for it. You’re obviously having to compete with Norwich City for supporters, but are you managing to persuade some of the Canaries to change their plumage occasionally?

The biggest disappointment I have is our gates. I read a lot that Non-League football is on the rise, but even with our success this season attendances haven’t grown as we would have liked. We’ve always played attractive football, and I’m hoping that if Norwich fall into their usual mid-table obscurity we might be able to attract more of their fans to come and watch us, but I’m not convinced that it will happen. During the international break our gate improved by about 30, and City didn’t even have a game- it’s perhaps the case that when people get a weekend off from football they just decide to do something else, rather than watch their local side.

Our ground is on the outskirts of town, although given the number of building developments recently the town seems to be spreading in our direction and perhaps that might help in the long run. But we absolutely need to get more people through the turnstiles. Perhaps if we can stay at the top end of the table and the matches become a little more loaded towards the end of the season, that will help. We need to be more inventive, though. We’ve thought about moving games to Friday and Monday nights, as other teams in the league have, but the problem there is that we’re rather a long way from anywhere and that’s unlikely to suit our opponents. A better option would be to try and get more of the youth players- and we have an extensive youth section below the Academy- and their families involved in watching the first team.

There must be something rather attractive about the club, though- it’s kept you there for fifteen years! How would you describe the club to people who don’t know a great deal about it?

It has the very best facilities in the area, outside of Norwich City and Kings Lynn. It’s a club where we’ve always invested in youth, and we look for continuity- we don’t rush people along, we coach and develop them, support them- it’s a great environment to play in and to coach in. Lots of players who have gone through our club are now playing at Step Three, Step Two and beyond- Luke Hannant at Gateshead in the National League, Danny Wright at Cheltenham Town (currently second in the scoring charts at Whaddon Road behind former Greenwich Borough striker Mohamed Eisa, incidentally)- it’s a place where players improve. It’s just a good place to be.

What was the transition like from Assistant Manager to Manager? Did it change your relationships with the squad?

If we weren’t doing well perhaps it would have been a lot more difficult on all levels! I made a decision to change the management structure and bring in both an Assistant Manager and a coach, as I knew that my work/life/family balance wouldn’t work without that extra pair of hands. There was a reason why I was an Assistant for so long- I didn’t think I’d have time for the Manager’s job! These changes have allowed me to spread the workload and remove some of the time pressures, and it’s worked very well, but it is a really difficult job sometimes.

Looking at the season so far, what has it taught you about yourself and your team?

That we’re more than competitive, and that if we continue to score the goals at the rate we’re scoring them, and to share them out across the side, that we’re capable of staying in the mix at the right end of the table. The league is extremely even- we recently played Romford, Mildenhall Town and Barking, for example, and if you knew nothing about our league you wouldn’t be able to look at those teams and say who was top, bottom or middle. But the biggest thing I’ve worked out is that there are goals in every team- we just need to score more than the opposition!

You had a difficult period at the start of the month, losing two games in a row, but have picked up again since. Is that your bad patch out of the way?

There is bound to be another difficult period before the season ends. Our philosophy is that with 46 matches to play and three points for a win we need to win games- if you’re drawing you’ll fall behind. Sometimes that attacking style can make you vulnerable.

On Saturday you went to Heybridge Swifts, one of the form sides of the season so far, and came away with three points. That made a lot of people sit up and take notice.

They created some super chances, and so did we. Both sides had around a dozen shots on goal, and it was a great advert for the division. We want to attack, and we know we’ll concede sometimes, but we believe we’ll score more than the opposition- and so far, it’s generally worked out that way.

Tomorrow you’re off back to Maldon, to take on The Jammers. They haven’t lost a match in two and a half months, are on a fabulous run, and have a striker- Junior Ogede-Uzokwe- who has already found the back of the net twenty three times this season. How will you approach the game, and how will you stop Junior- that seems to be the key, as they’ve only lost one league match that he’s scored in?

It’s no shock to me that they’re on a run. But their pitch is good, and we’ll be able to play our usual attacking game. It promises to be a great match- there’ll probably be a goal or two in it either way and the spectators should be in for a treat. Our plan to keep Junior quiet? We just plan to score more than them! We’ve done our homework, but my job is to concentrate on what we do well, not worry about what we’re up against.

Finally then, what are your ambitions? Personally, and for Dereham Town.

I’d like to continue to enjoy it and go as far as I can. That would, hopefully, mean that the club was in the Bostik Premier League. This season the squad has a great work ethic and a great spirit, and my role is to keep that going for as long as possible. If that gets us into the automatic promotion places then that would be superb, if it gets us into the playoffs, then great- and if we fall just short we’ll have ended up there for a reason.

Harry Cripps, that hard man Dereham and Millwall footballing demi-god of yesteryear, was once the subject of a song recorded by the Lions. The Ballad of Harry Cripps actually sounds nothing like a ballad- indeed it’s difficult to argue that it sounds anything like a song- but it is the only tune we can find that was written entirely about a Dereham resident, and that seems like an opportunity missed. Perhaps, if the Bostik title is attained, someone should persuade local singer-songwriter Beth Orton to get together with William Orbit once more and record a tribute to Neal Simmons.

The Bostik North trophy would indeed be Strange Cargo in these parts, but the idea certainly shouldn’t be thought of as impossible.