Whing hoping to bring in some help for his threadbare Puritans

Giorgio Rasulo celebrates after he scored the only goal of the game in Banbury's 1-0 FA Cup success at Stratford Town. Picture courtesy of Banbury United FC

The Puritans went to Stratford Town with just 12 fit players on Tuesday night but still managed to claim a 1-0 success, courtesy of Giorgio Rasulo’s goal, to book themselves a home date with Berkhamsted in the third qualifying round of the Emirates FA Cup on October 1.

Now third-placed United are gearing up for a return to Vanarama National League North action with back-to-back home games with second-placed Scarborough Athletic on Saturday and Gloucester City next Tuesday night.

And, with injuries and suspensions continuing to play havoc, Whing is hoping to strengthen things up.

“We are going to have to try to get one or two in just to give us a bit of breathing space,” the Puritans boss said.

“We will have Sam Brown and Harry Parsons back at the weekend but it looks like we have lost Jack Stevens through injury on Tuesday night, which is a massive blow for us and Jay Williams is still suspended for another couple of games.

“We will give the lads who are fit as much rest as we can and we will try to get a couple through the door so we can get a team out there.

“But we don’t make excuses. We are looking forward to another big game on Saturday.

“Scarborough are absolutely flying and then we have Gloucester on Tuesday so it’s two really big home games for us.”

Whing, meanwhile, heaped the praise on his players for their efforts as they edged past Stratford on Tuesday night.

“We knew it was going to be a tough game,” he added.

“Stratford have got some really good players, they’ve got a big squad full of experience and they have started off really well.

“We were down to 12 players but I thought the lads were tremendous.

“We had some really good chances, it was a bit end-to-end and there were some nervy moments and some last ditch defending but I thought we worked our absolute socks off and the players, again, deserve a massive amount of credit for getting through a tough tie.”