Carshalton Athletic ended their winless run in emphatic fashion on Saturday as they thrashed Chatham Town 6-1 at Colston Avenue.
Four goals by Tommy Bradford, now the Ryman South’s leading goalscorer with 24, plus two for on-loan debutant Omar Folkes gave the Robins a first win in seven games.
The three points keep Carshalton on the fringes of the play-off positions while Chatham remain in the bottom three and five points from safety.
“That was a massive result for us,” Bradford said after the game.
“We’d not won in six games, although we picked up a good point against second-placed Dorking last Monday.
“We knew that three points against Chatham would get us back amongst it and we’ve now got to kick on from this.”
It was Folkes, on a month’s loan from Ryman Premier outfit Merstham, that opened the scoring on 13 minutes as he latched onto Peter Adeniyi’s perfectly weighted through ball before blasting it home from 15 yards.
A patient build-up in the 22nd minute saw Carshalton cut through Chatham with five one-touch passes before Folkes’ neat flick put Adeniyi in on goal. He seemed odds-on to score but, as visiting keeper Alex Hyde came to narrow the angle, the player/manager squared for Bradford to tap home.
Then, just three minutes later, an inch-perfect cross from the right by Rio Davidson-Phipps was met by Folkes, who crashed home a first-time volley past the stricken goalkeeper.
“I liked both of my goals but the volley was pretty special, it was a great ball in by Rio,” said Folkes.
“I’ve come from a team that also likes to play the ball on the floor so it hasn’t taken me long to get involved here. I’ve been made to feel really welcome and I hope to continue helping the team.”
Bradford added his second just before half-time as he intercepted a poor pass on halfway before jinking past two opponents en route to shooting across Hyde and inside the far post.
The only blot on Carshalton’s performance came on 57 minutes as Chatham won a spot-kick which Ricky Freeman converted, but that failed to galvanise the visitors and Bradford went on to plunder a further two goals.
The first was a well-controlled finish on a dropping ball after Hyde had done well to parry an effort by Mickel Miller, while the second was a 20-yard drive into the bottom-right corner with 10 minutes to go.
The Robins will now need the likes of Bradford and Folkes to keep firing ahead of three straight away games – including one against promotion rivals Corinthian Casuals – over the next two weeks.
“We mustn’t get too far ahead of ourselves but we’ve got to be confident and look to win all three of these games,” added Bradford.
“But we can’t afford to get complacent so we’ll go into our game at Godalming tonight (Tuesday) ready to compete and we’ll try to make it back-to-back wins.”
Feature image of Omar Folkes courtesy of Ian Gerrard, with thanks
