Upbeat Di Paola feels Horsham are playing best football of his tenure, but must cut out mistakes

The Hornets have won one and lost three of their opening Bostik League South East fixtures so far this season as well as exiting the Velocity Trophy away to Bracknell Town on Tuesday night.

But boss Di Paola feels his side have more than competed in all of those defeats and hinted that they probably deserve to have had an unbeaten start to the new campaign.

He is happy with plenty of what he has seen from the new signings he has made over the summer and believes that if they can cut out the individual errors, they can really push on in the league.

An upbeat Di Paola said: “I do not think we are far off as we are playing ok, but there are just people making silly individual errors. We do need to get to the bottom of that as it is what is holding us back.

“We are not far away or off the standard of this league. We just need to get our heads around why we are making the mistakes, because at the moment, they are holding us back from being unbeaten.

“I know it’s an area we have to improve on. It’s a case of either the players stop doing it or we have to change things.

“It is an area we have to address as soon as possible and I do feel for the boys as we are playing some great football, I actually think the best since we have been here at Horsham.

“I read managers in the paper who say stuff like this and I hate myself for it, but I do not think we have been a poor team in any game so far. We have been either level or the better side.

“I do not feel the darkness has set in. We need to tweak things and we have got to seven games in and it’s a good bench mark. Last year at this stage, I thought we were miles off and I do not think that now.”

With the return of Steve Metcalf, Lewis Hyde and Joe Shelley, he is hoping a more settled back will four cut-out the errors.

Di Paola explained: “We also need to keep a settled side as we have had to keep changing the defence.

“That should change now and that will improve us. As a defence you always play better when you know who is around you and we haven’t been able to do that as yet.

“One area of the pitch that you have to have consistency is the defence and we have some coming back now, so a bit of continuity should improve us in there.”

Chris Smith will return for the FA Cup first qualifying round clash at Corinthian on Saturday, although Joe Taylor will be away on international duty with Montserrat for a CONCACAF Nations League qualification game against El Salvador.

Prize money of £6,000 is up for grabs as the Hornets travel to division-lower Corinthian on Saturday and Di Paola added: “They look a good side and I spoke to a couple of guys from Chipstead, who said they are very sharp and hardworking.

“We can’t beat around the bush, we have to put in a performance as we have a lot of quality in our side as well.”

Striker George Landais left the club last week to join rivals East Grinstead in search of regular game time.