IT was good enough for Hull City's Premier League boss Phil Brown, so it was good enough for AFC Sudbury's Nicky Smith.

Smith takes leave out of

Premier League boss

NON-LEAGUE

By Mike Bacon

IT was good enough for Hull City's Premier League boss Phil Brown, so it was good enough for AFC Sudbury's Nicky Smith.

Rollicking their players in front of the fans that is.

Brown famously kept his side on the pitch at half-time in a Premier League game against Manchester City last season, so disgusted was he by his side's performance.

And Smith did the same last weekend as woeful AFC Sudbury crashed to Beaconsfield in the Southern League Midlands Division.

From Smith's point of view, his half-time 'chat' in front of the fans appeared to work as, although they didn't come back to beat Beaconsfield last Saturday, they did pick up their first league win of the season against Soham Town Rangers on Tuesday night.

“Quite honestly, the game against Beaconsfield was one of the worse I have ever been involved in as a player or manager,” Smith said ahead of today's FA Cup clash at Woodford.

“We were simply awful and I decided to keep the players on the pitch at half-time, so they could be embarrassed in front of the fans.

“I told them many of them weren't as good as they think, their CV's may look good to them, but I'm not interested in that, only how they perform for me.

“In fairness the embarrassment of being on the pitch at half-time may just have worked because at Soham we were much better and deserved the win.”

AFC Sudbury have not set the world alight this season after a decent last campaign.

Today they travel to Woodford United in the FA Cup Preliminary round, who are in the same league as Sudbury, a team who have hardly pulled up any trees either this season.

And Smith knows the importance of the FA Cup.

“There is no doubt a good cup run is important, not just financially, but for the kudos of the club,” he said.

“Look what happened to Leiston last season, they get a good run and rightly gets lots of publicity because of it.”

For Sudbury, striker Danny Bloomfield could be back in the squad, having yet to feature for the King's Marsh side this season.

The winners of today's FA Cup games get �1,500, the rest of the ties involving local clubs being: Aylesbury Utd v Tiptree Utd (playing Sunday), Biggleswade Utd v Halstead Town, Burnham v Kentish Town, Cheshunt v Maldon, Dereham Town v Wroxham, East Thurrock Utd v Brentwood Town, FC Clacton v Hitchin Town, Great Wakering Rovers v Waltham Forest, Gorleston v Northampton Spencer, Hanwell Town v Concord Rgs, Kirkley & Pakefield v Cogenhoe Utd, Lowestoft Town v Great Yarmouth Town, Mildenhall Town v St Neots Town, Needham Market v Wisbech Town, Newport Pagnell Town v Heybridge Swifts, Norwich Utd v Long Buckby, Rothwell Corinthians v Godmanchester Rovers, Rothwell Town v Bury Town, Soham Town Rgs v St Ives, Stanway Rovers v Beaconsfield SCYOB and Witham Town v London Colney.