In this transcript of the Toolstation Western League podcast, hosted by local sports presenter, Ian Nockolds, Ian interviews Manager of Radstock Town, Ryan Child, on the Miners’ season so far.

Ian Nockolds: “Well, I’m delighted to welcome back to the Toolstation Western League podcast, Ryan Child, the Manager of Radstock Town. Ryan, congratulations on your win on Monday, it was the best of times, and it was the worst of times over the bank holiday weekend for you. I mean, which is the real Radstock town? Is it the one that lost at Gillingham, or is it the one that beat Sherborne?”

Ryan Child: “That’s a good question. We’ve had a really, really tough start to the season with availability. To give you some context, the game against Sherborne was the first time that we’ve been able to put out two centrebacks, and an out-and-out striker and an actual person that plays up front for 90 minutes within the team. So, that gives you some kind of idea of how we’ve been.

“I haven’t put the same team out once in any games – we’ve had players playing out of position, a lot of lads just doing their best in places where they really shouldn’t be playing, not at this level. So, I don’t know, I hope that after September, we can look at it and say that’s probably a more accurate reflection of what we are as a team, because we’ll have the players there to actually show that because, it’s not been good so far.

“And I think everyone’s had that issue. I would challenge anyone who’s had it worse than us. Our top scorer for the last three or four years has been out with a broken toe. We had our starting right-back, who tore his ankle ligaments three days before the season started. It’s one of them. You don’t want to make excuses, but then you look at the list, and I made a list. I made a list called, ’all the things that have gone wrong in my first beginning of the season.’ And it was very long, but we are getting there. So, very long-winded answer, and I’m sorry, but we will know, I think, by the end of September what the lads can actually do, because they will actually all be there!”

IN: “You’ve given us a flavour there, obviously, of some of the challenges you’ve been up against. How has the virus been affecting you? Have you lost any players through being pinged?”

RC: “Yeah. On average, we’ve had six players unavailable for every game. And that’s on an average. So, that’s gone up, we’ve had you know, eight, I think once we had ten players that were actually unavailable. And out of them, you’re looking at about seven that were our starting players.

“Now, that wasn’t all getting pinged. We’ve had lads that have gone on holiday, because they weren’t able to, but that was from the virus, obviously, because they come on late. It’s affected us massively; things have been completely different. Do you know a good thing, and I was chatting to the Sherborne Manager about this and a couple of the other lads that have been doing it longer than I have, and I’ve asked nearly all of them – is it always like this? They’ve all said, ’Look, don’t worry too much. You don’t generally get it this bad!’”

IN: “Let’s talk about Sherborne, because they’ve had a fantastic start to this season. Given everything you’ve just said, not least the result against Gillingham, it would be quite understandable for you to have gone into that game fearing the worst – but did you do anything differently? Was it just the fast turnaround and the opportunity to perhaps get that Saturday result out of the system that meant that you took all three points against Sherborne on Monday?”

RC: “First of all, yes, it helped to play so quickly after Gillingham, we had a very frank discussion after that game, we had players missing, and it was difficult. I think with Sherborne we did a slightly different thing, in terms of asking the players to almost make a list of things that they’re going to hold each other accountable for, not for it to be on the management’s back. We want them to do things, we ask them to do things, but actually they need to stand up and look at each other on the pitch and know that they’re holding each other accountable. So, we did an exercise before the Sherborne game, and they wrote a couple of things down, put it up on the wall and they said, ’right, this is what we’re going to be as a team going forward.’

“Now that we’ve got players back, in many ways, we’ve said Monday, this is really where our season starts and there’s no excuses from now on. So, although I’ve spent the last five minutes giving you a ton of excuses, for us, on that Monday, that all goes out the window, and we need to step up and have a performance and we need a reaction – and they reacted. The players stood up and realised that if they do things the way they were doing it, they’re gonna get beaten by teams that certainly we didn’t think that we should be getting beaten by. So, it was a credit to the players really, and that was the main thing – attitude.”

IN: “We’ve just started September and you’ve already played nine matches. Given what you’ve said about the issues with availability, obviously that’s made the start difficult for you.”

RC: “It has made it difficult, but other teams have done the same. My main query would be that, as of now on the fixture list, we’ve only got three games in September. If we’re going to do all those games in August, but then we’re only going to have three in September... at the very least we could have done, say, six in September, and then fewer in August, or balanced it out. I’m struggling at the moment to understand the fixtures.”

IN: “The way things worked out last season, you were obviously in the hunt for promotion, with the methodology that the FA used to combine the two Covid-interrupted seasons. The club put in an application that in the event you were given the opportunity, you would have gone up. Were you up for the challenge of playing in the Western League Premier Division?”

RC: “Yeah, so Simon the Chairman, Dave, the rest of the committee, are all massively behind that. And we were planning to go up. So, right till the day that we were told that we weren’t, basically. And we were very confident that we’ve got the team to be able to do that. But on the basis of what’s happened, in terms of how many clubs went into that league from Cornwall, it’s not as attractive, I’ll have to be honest with you. And also, with the amount of unavailability that we’ve had and how Covid has affected us and all the rest of it, I think it’s probably a blessing in the end, that we didn’t go up. The team behind me, and the management, and certainly the club were really pushing it, and so we and the players were a bit gutted that we didn’t go up, to be honest with you.

“In the end, I think we missed out by 0.1 of a point or something ridiculous. And you know, you look back at the game against Longwell Green, where they scored in the last minute, and you think, ’right, that could have been it’, but you know, what’s gone is gone. We’re just focusing on this season. And, you know, maybe there’s a hangover from that where the players are looking at it, thinking, ’Oh, well, we should be in the league above blah, blah, blah.’ But at the end of the day, if you don’t turn up to places like Gillingham, you’re never going to get out of this league. So, we just have to keep going and beat what’s in front of us, really.”

IN: “It’s an interesting one, isn’t it? Because it’s sort of a non-traditional way of being disappointed. Normally, the league table doesn’t lie and at the end of the season you either get the promotion place or you don’t, and I know we’ve sort of reflected on clubs that have narrowly missed out on whether they can go again. But actually, to not be able to go again because of the coronavirus pandemic is a very strange set of criteria, it’s a very strange time that we’re working in. But it is interesting to hear you reflect on whether or not, actually, that opportunity to go up has meant that the players have had perhaps a bit of a dip this season.”

RC: “I think potentially ... Just looking at the league in general, the games that we’ve watched, and we’ve played in, I think the standard has dropped significantly from two years ago when we had a full season. Watching the games, the quality of football isn’t as good, definitely. The game that we played against Warminster, one of the worst games of football I’ve ever seen in my entire life, playing or managing. The standard was so low and that was really unexpected, but I’ve seen it throughout. I haven’t watched us play a team where I’ve thought, ’oh, you know, they’re really decent.’ Probably Sherborne were not bad, Lebeq had spells where they looked like a good team, but a lot of it has gone really downhill. And I think that’s got to do with the pandemic. I think it’s that lads haven’t played football for two years maybe, properly, you know, really put a stint in. Because it takes 10-15 games for you to really get your eye in and to be feeling like, ’right, I’m really on this.’ And I think that, probably, as a league, and I expect it’s around the country, the standard is definitely pretty low at the moment. Hopefully that gets a little bit better as the season goes on because it’s not great to watch.”

IN: “Well, that’s a shining endorsement for Western League First Division!”

RC: “Yeah. I don’t think it’s just the Western League. I would be surprised if it’s not everywhere, but it’s definitely a thing.”

IN: “It’s an interesting point. So, in terms of your own ambitions for this season then, obviously you’ve mentioned that you don’t really know where Radstock are going to be shaping up until you’ve got out of September, which is not an unreasonable point to make. But, what are your ambitions for this season?”

RC: “Before the season started; promotion. And I would say it’s still that. As I said, I haven’t seen any teams that I think are particularly good. Welton have made a strong start but again, I haven’t actually ... we’ve seen them play once against Longwell Green, and again, for me, the standard was pretty low. So, I think if we can pull it together, we’ve got a chance of being in that pack to look at promotion. But again, you’ve got to just win one game at a time at the moment. It’s a cliche, you know, I feel stupid even saying we’ve got a target at the moment, because things are just so all over the place, and they have been, that we need to just settle down, take it, have a look where we are at Christmas, and then we can really say, ’Okay, well we’re banging the pack still, let’s have a good crack at promotion.’ But that’s what we want, but what we want and what we can achieve is based really on the commitment and the attitude of the players. And as of now, that remains to be seen, although I do think they can do it, but we’ve got to start winning games.”

IN: “And if promotion means going into the Premier Division and all that entails with the travel distances, then you can live with that?”

RC: “Yeah, fantastic, why not? There’s absolutely no point in doing stuff if you’re not committed to being as good as you can be. Again, that’s been a big frustration as we haven’t been able to do that yet. But yeah, absolutely. The club are up for it, like I said before we started this interview, there’s a lot of money going into the kind of refurbishment of the ground and the area around it. And we’ve got a really young team who are improving and they’re all ambitious as well – they were really disappointed not to go up so yeah, the club are ready to do it, there’s been talk that we might even get moved sideways into the Hellenic, potentially. So, you do as best as you can, and then you just go for it, I think that’s the attitude of the club at the moment.”

IN: “Looking down the hill into Midsomer Norton, obviously, Welton Rovers are going rather well. In fact, actually, I mean, they’re going so well, they’re sort of running away with it a little bit at the moment. Do you see them being there or thereabouts come the end of the season?”

RC: “Well, they’re going about it pretty well to have that, aren’t they? I just don’t see anybody that I’ve seen that’s massively good. I think Welton have been able to take advantage of that because they’ve had a pretty settled team. But we’ll see, I can’t wait to play them on Boxing Day. I’m looking forward to that one, whether or not they’ll run away with it, or they’ll just fall back into the pack, I’m not sure. That remains to be seen. But last night’s result against Cheddar, that was a huge result for them to be fair. So, we’ll see, but they’ve got a decent team out there, they’ve got a good budget up there, so it’s to be expected.”

IN: “What about any of the other sides in the First Division? Who else do you think might be there or thereabouts come the final whistle?”

RC: “It’s difficult, isn’t it? Because before the season, I would have said Wincanton, and they’ve had a really strange start and then they’ve gone and won 9-1. And that does sum up the season so far, doesn’t it? I mean, even Cheddar, really good start, you’ve seen them get beaten pretty comfortably, and you’ve seen them beat teams really comfortably as well. Cheddar are always going to be strong, Welton have made a good start, Sherborne looked like a decent team when we played them.”

IN: “You mentioned earlier that your next home game is against Arundel in the FA vase, that’s coming up on 11th September. You also talked about the investment that’s going on up in Southfields and we’ve sort of covered that, certainly during lockdown. I know there’s a lot of excellent work done to the clubhouse. I came up earlier this season and saw it myself. So, really that Arundel game in the vase, it’s exciting, I know it’s an important opportunity for you on the pitch to progress in that competition but off the pitch, it’s a great opportunity for people to come and see what’s going on at Radstock Town.”

RC: “Absolutely. It’s such a welcoming club Radstock. It’s a real family club – they held a food drive during the pandemic and made a massive community effort. There are loads of people up there, putting a significant amount of money that they’ve managed to get from grants into the club. So, they’ve got a five-year plan, which is pretty impressive actually. So, we are looking forward to Arundel coming down, but it’s hard – you want them to see all those things off the pitch, but at the end of the day, we need to just start stringing some wins together. That really is what makes a good football club, is winning football games.”

IN: “Ryan, thank you very much for your time.”