Sidmouth Town sit bottom of the South West Peninsula League Eastern Division table after an early season run of five games without a win, and just a single point to show for their efforts so far.

However, Town boss Josh Stunell is not hiding behind any excuses. Indeed, he knows what is currently going wrong and is convinced that things will change sooner, rather than later.

He says: “It really is a case of fine margins just now. We are getting beaten by the odd goal and, in general, our team play is good. Defensively we look sound and, for my money, all that needs to change is good old lady luck, something we have certainly not enjoyed so far this term.”

Stunell makes a good point – take last Saturday’s 2-1 defeat at St Martins where Danny Clay was fouled and fell to the ground whereupon the match official decided he was ‘play acting’ and awarded a free-kick that was turned past young Josh McLean in the Town goal.

The Viking’s lack of ‘lady luck’ was also evident in the Tuesday night 1-0 defeat at new boys Honiton Town who won the game with a goal that may well end up being the ‘goal of the season’ – a clinically executed lobbed effort from distance by Ben Ede that gave McLean no chance.

Stunell says: “Those two, match defining incidents, summed up where we are just now. We really are not far off our opponents, but the little things continue to go against us. The Danny [Clay] incident at St Martins would have been laughable had it not led to us shipping what proved to be the winning goal – he was fouled, simple as that! Then the Ben Ede goal at Mountbatten Park was out of the top drawer of special strikes.

“Yes, you could argue that we had given him time and space o execute the effort, something I have personally seen him do over the years, but it was a terrific goal and even then, we had time to open them up only for Ash [Small] to somehow miss the target form six yards! We were left feeling that when your luck is out – it sure is out.”

The Town boss says confidence is not an issue: “The lads are confident and clearly not allowing things to get on top of them. The thing is that they are an honest bunch and they recognize that we are not far away in any shape or form and once the tide turns and we start getting our fair share of good fortune the little things will begin to go our way and we will see a very sudden change in our fortunes.”

There was something else the Town boss was keen to say and it was with regard to a lot of ‘hot gossip’ about his team.

He said: “Of course, when things go against you for a period of time the usual ‘merchants of doom’ come out of the woodwork. Well, lets squash them right now. We are in this together at Town and we are going to find a way out of it and I am convinced will soon be upwardly mobile and those gossip merchants can then turn their attention to debate other club’s woes.”

This Saturday (September 2), Town are in Manstone Lane action with the visit of an Ilfracombe Town (3pm).

Stunell says: “I’d like to think we can kick-start our campaign with a win against what I expect to be quality opposition.”