Blues boss Luke Parsons says play-off defeat has made Newark Town even more determined to succeed.
Town suffered a 2-1 home reverse to Harrowby United in Saturday’s United Counties League Division One promotion final, in front of a bumper crowd of 983.
But despite the heartbreak of going so close to promotion for the second successive season, Parsons wants the positives from this campaign to galvanise his squad going forward.
“I think ultimately you’ve got to be proud of what you’ve done,” he told the Advertiser.
“Two years on the trot we’ve reached the play-offs and some teams can be in that league for 10 years before they’ve even made the play-offs, so I think there has to be a lot of pride in how far the club’s come in the last two years.
“We’ve only had two years at step six and both those years we’ve reached the play-offs.
“We’ve not achieved what we wanted to do do, but in the end we reached the top five, which we set out to do, reached the final and had a big crowd at home.
“It’s certainly some sort of success.”
Harry Allcock netted either side of half time for the Arrows, with Blues substitute Ryan Smith netting a later header to give the hosts some hope in a contest where Town attacker Lewis Chambers saw a penalty kick fly the wrong side of the crossbar.
Despite this weekend’s setback, Parsons, who has been involved with the club for much of his life, is adamant that top five finishes over the past two seasons will leave the Blues in a strong position for the upcoming campaign both on and off the pitch.
“I’ve been part of Newark football pretty much all my life. I played for Newark Town at under sevens, worked my way up to under 16s, under 18s, played Saturday, Sunday.
“I’ve worked my way up and always said Newark’s always been a well supported town, they always come out in numbers no matter the occasion.
“It just needs a little bit of success to bring the club and fans together and they rally behind you, as we proved on Saturday how good of a community Newark is.
“It does drive you. You want more days like that.”
