WITHAM Town manager Adam Flint is ready to freshen up his squad after another lacklustre performance saw their winless Bostik League division north run stretched to four games.

His team’s 2-0 defeat at Mildenhall Town in midweek left Flint reflecting on his players’ levels of application and he admitted that he is contemplating changes as he prepares to take his team to Grays Athletic for an Essex derby on Saturday.

Flint said: “I think our form is a worry and we have to freshen things up.

“We haven’t done it as soon as we have in the past, but we brought in younger players like Chi (Chinedu Osadebe) and Kofi (Gyebi) at a similar time last year and it worked for us then. They responded well and I think we may need to do it again.

“We’ve introduced Jack Kemsley and Max Wilson in the last couple of weeks and they’ve done really well. There are still 42 points to play for and we still have games in hand so we can get up into the top eight, but looking at the sides behind us and there are teams who are catching us up.

“I want to finish above the Tilburys and Sudburys and be strong into the end of the season as that shows intent for next year.

“We have to get that into them and there were some harsh words at Mildenhall.

“I said to them after that game that I have made decisions on some of them for next year after what I’ve been seeing, but they have until the end of the season to show me that they want to be part of what we are doing.

“They have to show us that they want to be here, otherwise, see you later.

“We have Grays coming up on Saturday and then face Heybridge twice and I’m going to need players who really care and will turn up for them, but I need players who aren’t just going to turn up for a local derby and the big occasion; I need players who will turn up on a cold night at Mildenhall in midweek.”

The Town boss said he hoped to have John Watson available for the trip to Grays after a hamstring problem kept him out on Tuesday, and to have Sam Owusu and Chinedu Osadebe available again as well.

Flint added that his players would see some hard training ahead of Saturday’s game, with not much ball work on offer and plenty of tough drills to show them how their performance at Mildenhall wasn’t up to the standard expected.

“It was not our best,” added Flint.

“We were a lot better second half after we’d got into them and we had a couple of chances, but the first 30 minutes were poor.

“We were going up the hill in the first half and it was diabolical to be honest.

“The instructions we gave them weren’t followed and we just couldn’t defend.

“We’d warned them about one lad, but didn’t pick him up from a set piece and he got in round the back and hit the ball in on the half volley.

“That was typical and they were 2-0 up at half-time.

“Do you know what it felt like? - it felt like a fixture where there were four games to go in the season and nothing to play for.

“We were missing Sam Owusu, Chi (Osadebe) and Moulaye (Aidara), but Mildenhall weren’t at full strength either.

“I’ve seen them a lot this year and they weren’t at their strongest, but their manager agreed at the end and said it looked like an end-of-season game.

“The difference was that they had two chances and took them.

“So maybe we have to freshen things up a bit as some of the players need a kick.

“They were better in the second half and there were players who didn’t put it in first half, but did in the second and we created more chances but that first half wasn’t good enough.

“There were players who did well, like Kofi (Gyebi), Jack Kemsley when he came on, Tommy Robinson and Max Wilson and Shami (Pedulu) had a better second half, but it wasn’t a good team performance.”