Blues look to bounce back

Blues will look to bounce back from back-to-back defeats as they travel to Folkestone Invicta for a league game on Saturday.

Steve Smith and Jamie Cureton’s team will visit a Folkestone side who are currently 14th in the table with 23 points from 19 games. It will give Stortford the chance for revenge as the Kent side won 1-0 at the ProKit UK Stadium on September 1, which prior to Saturday’s loss against Lewes was their last home defeat.

Invicta’s FA Cup hopes ended at the first hurdle a week after that game against Blues as they went down 1-0 at Burgess Hill Town, but they reached the third qualifying round of the FA Trophy with comfortable wins against Leatherhead and Didcot Town before losing to National League South highflyers Woking. They have also progressed to the quarter-finals of the league cup with wins against Ashford United, Sittingbourne and Hayes & Yeading United.

September’s meeting was the first between the two clubs. When Folkestone folded in 1990, Invicta were playing local league football in nearby Hythe. However, they returned to the town in 1991, taking over Folkestone’s old Cheriton Road in 1991 and rapidly moved up the pyramid.

They were one of the clubs transferred from the Southern League to the Isthmian in the 2004 reorganisation which saw Conference North and South formed and have split their 14 years in the competition between the Southern and Premier divisions.