A ‘sense of relief’ as Jones secures his first win as Banbury boss

Having suffered back-to-back 3-0 defeats at home to Spennymoor Town and away at Scarborough Athletic in their first two games, the Puritans hit back with an impressive 2-0 success at Gloucester City in midweek.

Two goals from Ken Charles proved to be enough to secure United’s first three points of the season in the Vanarama National League North.

And boss Jones said: “There’s a bit of a sense of relief I suppose.

“When you have been beaten 3-0 in your first two games, you are going into that third game and there is obviously a bit of pressure on to get something.

“It was a good team performance, it was quite difficult to single out individuals. All of the players contributed.

“It shows us that if we can produce those types of performances together as a team, we can do okay.

“What we also managed to do on Tuesday was put together a 90-minute performance.

“In the previous games, we played reasonably well in the first half against Spennymoor but let ourselves down in the second.

“And it was the reverse at Scarborough because we were very poor in the first half and then showed a bit of character and fight in the second.

“I was pleased with a more complete performance over the duration of the whole game.

“We had a lot of sevens and eights out of 10 in our team and when you have that, it gives you a great chance.”

Banbury face a stern test on home soil this weekend when they entertain much-fancied Chester.

And Jones is hoping his team and the club as a whole have been lifted by that midweek success.

“The win would have given everyone a lift and confidence is a big thing,” he added.

“We understand it’s going to be a very tough game for us against Chester, they are one of the teams who are quite fancied.

“We will have to be at our best but we can look forward to it.

“I think we are expecting a big crowd with Chester bringing a healthy contingent and hopefully our win at Gloucester will result in more of our fans coming down and watching us.”