Goals flowing, Wins coming? – Maidenhead strikers believe the tide Is turning

Josh Umerah celebrates his goal against Hemel. Photo: Darren Woolley

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Maidenhead United strikers Josh Umerah and Liam Dulson both found the back of the net in Tuesday’s 2-2 draw with Hemel Hempstead Town at York Road, and afterwards they both agreed there were more positives than negatives to take from the clash as they look to kick-start their National League South campaign over the bank holiday weekend.

United are slowly warming to their challenge of becoming a competitive side in the National League South, having followed up their disappointing opening day defeat to Chesham United with more positive performances against Enfield Town on Saturday and Hemel on Tuesday night.

But while the positives from those performances outweighed the negatives, the Magpies are still looking for their first league win after being held to draws by Enfield and Hemel.

After finding the net in Tuesday’s draw with the Tudors, Umerah said he feels the goals and results will start to flow more easily in the coming weeks.

“There are more positives to take from this game,” he said. “We didn’t lose and we’re now going into two games on the spin this weekend and anything can happen. If we’re able to get six points from those matches, we’re in good nick moving forward.”

Umerah opened his account for the season in the Magpies 2-1 opening day defeat to the Generals and he finished off another well-worked move on Tuesday night to restore the home side’s lead in the first half. Sadly, despite taking the lead twice, and dominating the second half in terms of pressure and chances, the Magpies couldn’t claim the win their performance just about merited.

A great team goal, slotted home by Josh Umerah for our second last night pic.twitter.com/5WI5GsWAxP

— Maidenhead United (@MUFCYorkRoad) August 20, 2025

“We need to work on that as a team so when we do get ahead, we don’t concede as many goals,” he said. “With regards to me, yeah, I’m confident. For any team I play I want to score goals and help the team. That’s something I’ll continue to do for the rest of the season.

“Their penalty before half-time stole a bit of our momentum, but what can you do. We just had to get our heads up and go again.

“Another positive we can take from the game is that we continued to try and attack them. It wasn’t to be but on to the next game.

“100 per cent (a win is just around the corner). I fully believe this team can go on to win the league. We’ve got some good players and a good manager and I’m feeling positive.”

Dulson also scored his first competitive goal for the Magpies in Tuesday’s game with Hemel, turning home Josh Popoola’s cross in the eighth minute to put the home side in front. He was a constant menace on the left of the Magpies attack and was unfortunate not to score a late winner when Hemel keeper Michael Johnson pulled off a wonderful close range save.

A first league goal for Liam Dulson in a Maidenhead United shirt at York Road last night pic.twitter.com/JwmW8qGmH5

— Maidenhead United (@MUFCYorkRoad) August 20, 2025

Reflecting on the game, he said: “I thought it was a really good performance from the boys and there were lots of positives to take out of that game.

“The last few games as well, we’ve been dominating teams. But we just seem to have a spell where teams are getting one or two chances and they’re putting them away. We haven’t been as clinical, but it’s going to come soon.

“As you could see out there, we dominated them and dominated the game. We had good possession, created the chances and we’ve just got to put them away when we get them. I had a couple tonight. The keeper made a good save with one of them and it’s just been one of those nights.

“On another night that shot goes in. But we’ve got to get our head down now and keep working hard. We work a lot on of patterns of play in the week and both of those goals were well worked. We were pleased with them as a team and personally I was pleased to score the first.

“I think so far that (Hemel) is the best performance we’ve had so far, and it shows in the two goals we’ve scored. We’ve just got to keep building and if we play like that, we’ll win games.”

United are back in action at Weston Super Mare on Saturday before welcoming Horsham to York Road on Bank Holiday Monday. Weston sit 11th in the table after claiming their first win at Chippenham Town on Tuesday while Horsham ground out a draw at Chesham on Tuesday after losing their opening fixtures to Chelmsford City and Worthing.

“We’ll get back in on Thursday, regroup as a team and work hard and try and get three points on Saturday, we’ll worry about Monday afterwards,” added Dulson.