Farnham Town made a summer bid to try to lure Dean Rule to the club.

The highly-regarded striker instead decided to return to Badshot Lea – but how Town manager Sean Birchnall must be wishing the negotiations had turned out rather differently.

Creating chances isn’t a problem for Town at the moment – but putting them away is.

Birchnall said: “We drew 2-2 at Frimley Green last week and we created so many opportunities.

“I’m not saying it’s all down to bad finishing – there’s some good defending and good goalkeeping there too. But we should be putting teams to bed – we have to learn quickly.

“My son played with Dean at the youth set-up at Camberley and I know him, so I had a chat with him to see whether he might fancy coming to Town. But he’s an honest lad and said he was going back to Badshot Lea. I had no trouble with that – if a player of Dean’s ability is available, you’re always going to try to get him.

“At Frimley it was down to poor defending for one goal and a bad decision for the second, when our keeper James Ferguson tried to catch the ball under pressure instead of punching it clear.

“But I don’t blame James one bit – he’s a young lad and a very good goalkeeper who has done really well for us and he will learn from it. He has made hardly an error for us all season.

“We have to put the result behind us and move on and prepare for the league game against Horley at home on Saturday, and then travelling to Fleet on bank-holiday Monday (11.30am). Games are coming along thick and fast but we are prepared for that. We spent a lot of time in pre-season working on our fitness and for the past couple of weeks we have got a settled squad of about 18 or 20.

“Some players have decided to leave because they wanted more minutes on the pitch than we have been able to give them with such a big squad– Joe Sowden and Danillo Pereira have left which is a shame, as I liked both of them. But that’s football.

“Charlie Oakley has also left us.

“They want to play every single minute of every single game, which is fair enough – but we can’t guarantee that.

“We have enough strength in depth to soak up the gaps and we are ready to go again.”