Picking up where we left off last time, a drubbing at Munto Finance Allstars, the Daggers soon put to bed any thoughts of a downturn in fortunes. The very next game saw us hand out an identical thrashing to unfortunate Lincoln, who subsequently sacked the management. Jon Nurse came back into the side due to Taiwo’s departure, and John Still could not have hoped for a better outcome.
Nursey finally appears to have found his goalscoring boots this season, and he took just 13 minutes to score in this game. He cut in from the left and after a one-two with Benson, slotted the ball past Burch. The move itself seemed to be more a series of ricochets than any deliberate flowing football but when it’s your day, it’s your day. The game was wrapped up in clinical fashion in the second period, Danny Green’s placed finish could not have been any more perfect into the top corner, and Nurse grabbed his second, stabbing an Arber knock-down through Burch’s slippery hands and legs. You could see why the Imps’ chairman felt the need for change – the game was in truth a stroll for the Daggers. Lincoln are likely to be mid-table though and this sort of win bodes well.
After a midweek jaunt and rather predictable loss at MK Dons in the whatever-it’s-called Trophy, a good point was taken away from the west country. Cheltenham have assembled a rag-arse-rovers side but are holding their own with creaking strike force Hayles and Alsop. Benson scored a typical goal – popping up in the box to place the ball into the top corner – and the Daggers seemed on course for a win. However the Robins came back strong and scored an equaliser, surprise surprise a header, and it was then left to Tony Roberts to produce some magnificent goalkeeping to protect the draw.
Back on home soil, Chesterfield were the next visitors and hoping to keep eleven men on the pitch this time around. With chief thug Rob Page in the side, this is no mean feat. The Daggers didn’t start particularly well and aptly-named striker Wade Small had several half-chances. Thankfully he decided that hitting the ball as hard as possible was the best way, both efforts landing somewhere in Bury Road. Will Antwi made a rare foray forwards to notch a goal but only after much-maligned Scott Doe had made a wonderful goal-saving tackle on Lester. It is little wonder Doe is finding life difficult at Victoria Road; he is replacing an often-undervalued but very good full-back in Danny Foster, and receives very little in the way of protection from new fan-favourite Danny Green. Whilst Green’s lack of defensive nous is being overlooked, Doe is suffering somewhat. It is probably fair to say though that he isn’t doing himself any favours – wayward distribution, poor positioning and powder-puff clearances being three worrying traits.
The eventual winning goal was so good, we’ll start a whole new paragraph for it. Ignoring Benson’s earlier headed miss from three yards is easy after finishes like this. Only Kevin Austin knows what he was trying to do when he got under the ball and propelled it into the air with the back of his neck, but thankfully Benno wasn’t too busy laughing to chest it down and whip a volley over Tommy Lee’s head from the edge of the box. A superb piece of technique that deserved to win the game. Unfortunately it seemed his team-mates agreed and the Daggers conceded a rather poxy goal to set up a frantic end to the game where the Spirites could easily have grabbed a point.
And so onto newly promoted Burton, who have made a fairly decent start with goals flying in at either end. You could say the Daggers’ victory was fortuitous based on a rather brilliant miss from Corbett from about 10cm out and a saved penalty. However we did create more opportunities and the penalty decision was quite poor, Harrad just falling over a prone Antwi. Benson popped up early on with a poacher’s goal, and it was enough for the sort of three points you need to stay at the top end of the league. To rub salt in, Branston was dismissed for the Brewers for a pretty stupid challenge when Benno threatened to run clear on goal.
On Saturday, friendly rivals Morecambe visited Victoria Road off the back of a win against Munto Finance Allstars but with a poor run of form prior to that. They couldn’t be bothered to turn up with a kit that wasn’t either red or blue – it’s not as if we suddenly changed our colours is it? – so we played in yellow. Resplendent in our kit, the Shrimps were rightly dazzled and really the game should have been put to bed before the break. 
Josh Scott scored at the second attempt but Griffiths couldn’t add to his improving tally, putting a good chance over the bar. It is probably time to stop appealing for penalties as yet again we had a totally inept referee in charge, who decided that fat boy Jim Bentley shoving Josh into the wall wasn’t a foul, and a Bentley elbow to the back of Benson’s head also wasn’t a foul. Bentley spent last week fondling Sol Campbell’s ‘moobs’ and presumably had given the referee similar sinister warnings in order to ensure a lack of penalisation – he’s the kind of bloke you can imagine having a string of prison bitches if he ever finds himself in the slammer.
The second half had two main talking points, and both were again called incorrectly by the referee. Firstly Drummond pushed the ball beyond Roberts and conned the ref with his dying swan routine despite no hint of any contact, Jevons scoring the penalty. Then Ian Craney launched a crunching assault on admittedly less-than-snow-white Thurgood and somehow escaped with a booking. The Daggers missed further chances to win and Morecambe got what they came for, but it was a sad state to see them in. Quietly improving their squad from last season, they seemed set for the top end of the table but are reduced to fielding carthorses like Danny Adams and David Artell, and cultured midfielders like Drummond and Craney are reduced to hammering the ball the length of the pitch. A very cynical performance littered with fouls and play-acting which is nothing like the Morecambe of old. Well, apart from former foe Rigoglioso.
And so we finish on a similar note to last time. We’ll gloss over this one, an abject 2-0 defeat at Barnet with, yes you guessed it, another penalty decision against the Daggers. Losing one out of six is a pretty good return so we can’t be downhearted. Onwards and upwards with plenty of hope for the season.
