Dandy Town Hornets, the defending Premier Division champions, have a score to settle in tomorrow’s Charity Cup with FA Cup champions Robin Hood at Bernard Park.
Jomar Wilkinson’s side will look to avenge April’s 2-0 FA Cup final defeat to Hood, which denied Hornets a third successive win the competition, as well as a league and cup double.
“We take every trophy seriously,” Wilkinson said. “We want to win every competition we are in, that’s our mentality at Dandy Town.
“Robin Hood beat us in the FA Cup and we’re quite aware of that, so we’re looking forward to the challenge and definitely putting our best foot forward.”
Town are bidding for three straight Charity Cup titles after beating Somerset Trojans 3-0 and 4-0 in the previous two season openers.
“This is another chance to make history and hopefully we can be successful,” Wilkinson said. “We definitely would like to bring that Charity Cup back home to Dandy Town.”
Wilkinson has been forced to tweak his line-up after losing the services of eight players during the off season.
Goalkeeper Mikkail Crockwell and midfielder Fabian Frankson have both joined First Division St David’s, defender George Dyer has moved to Wolves, brothers Tristan and Tymon Daniels to X-Roads and Forward Quadir Maynard to Young Men’s Social Club.
Town will look to young goalkeeper Ajani Daniels to fill the void left by Crockwell.
“Losing Mikkail was a huge loss for us,” Wilkinson said. “But we have our young goalkeeper Ajani who we’re are looking to push and hopefully he can go from strength to strength.
“We also have another young goalkeeper who plays for our under-16 team, Jaden Manders, who can be bumped up to the Player Development League level and then we can go from there.
“We always look to give our youngsters experience.”
Manders is the son of former Town goalkeeper Anthony “Porky” Manders.
One player that Wilkinson is delighted to still have at his disposal is Damon Ming, who has committed to another season after initially hinting at retirement.
“It was most pleasing for my ears to hear that Damon has committed to another season,” Wilkinson said.
“He says this is his last season, but he said that previously and has been taking things one season at a time. Damon loves football and adds a lot to the team. His experience and knowledge of the game goes a long way.” Kick is 5pm.
