‘It’s a sad day for Moneyfields’ – chairman Pete Seiden on boss Dave Carter’s decision to join AFC Portchester

That is the view of Moneyfields chairman Pete Seiden after Carter quit as boss of the Dover Road club on Monday afternoon.

He was unveiled as the Royals manager a few hours later and now has the chance of becoming the first boss to win promotion to the Southern League from the Wessex League with two different clubs.

Carter had previously taken Moneys up in 2016/17 - his first full season at the club after leaving Horndean in October 2015.

Seiden is now expecting history to repeat itself.

‘Portchester put in a request to speak to Dave last week, and we agreed - we would never stand in anyone’s way,’ he told The News.

‘I wasn’t really surprised - nothing surprises me in football anymore.

‘I knew Portchester were looking for a manager, and Dave is a proven winner.

‘If I’d been Portchester chairman, I’d have been looking at Dave.

‘They’ve got it right off the field, but need to get it right on the field.

‘I’m sure they’ll chuck the kitchen sink at it now to get out of the Wessex and with Dave there I’m sure they will.

‘With their resources and Dave’s experience, they will be massive favourites.

‘I would be amazed if they didn’t win the Wessex by 20 points next season.’

Seiden will now wait to see whether Carter tries to persuade any of his former players to follow him to The Crest Finance Stadium.

‘I know how football works. We got Dave from Horndean, they probably weren’t too happy, and he went back and signed a few of their players,’ Seiden recalled.

‘Now Portchester have done it to us.

‘I would be disappointed if clubs weren’t interested in our manager or our players, if they weren’t it would be because we weren’t doing very well.

‘We have some excellent players - clubs come in for them every summer.

‘We have players who would guarantee Portchester winning the Wessex League if Dave wanted to sign them.’

In local football, players’ loyalty can often be to a manager rather than a club.

Carter left Horndean in October 2015, after Miles Rutherford had resigned his role at Dover Road. At the time the Deans were unbeaten in the Wessex Premier, having won six and drawn twice, and had also progressed through two rounds of the FA Vase.

Carter was return to Five Heads Park to sign a host of players for Moneys - among them Gary Austin, Dan Hayes, Nathan Paxton, Dan Woodward, Louie Martin and Alex Sheppard.

At the time, though, all those were swapping one Wessex League Premier club for another. Now, if Carter is interested in any of his former Moneys squad, he must sweet-talk them into dropping down a division.

Seiden certainly didn’t want to lose a manager who oversaw Moneys’ best-ever runs in the FA Cup, FA Trophy, FA Vase and Hampshire Senior Cup. In addition, they won the Portsmouth Senior Cup in 2018/19.

‘It’s a sad day for the club. We didn’t want to Dave to leave,’ Seiden added. ‘I thought he’d be here until he stopped (managing) and then Gav (Spurway) would take over.

‘We did all we could to persuade Dave to stay, but we can’t twist his arm.

‘I wish Dave well, I have nothing but praise for him, I won’t say a bad word against him.’

Moneyfields have hardly played a league game in the past 12 months due to three national lockdowns. They have only completed four out of 38 Southern League Division 1 South games this season.

And Seiden feels the coronavirus crisis has contributed to Carter’s departure.

‘I don’t think the lockdowns have helped - people have got too much time on their hands to think. I’m sure Dave wouldn’t have left if we hadn’t had the pandemic

‘All the uncertainty probably hasn’t helped either. We’re coming up to March soon and they (the FA) still haven’t made a decision on the season. How hard can it be?

‘Portchester were able to come in at the right time.’

Moneys should be able to attract some quality applicants to succeed Carter. They are a step 4 club, will be playing in a new ground on a 3G pitch in 2022, their reserve team are in the Hampshire Premier League, and there are youth teams at most age groups.

‘Moneyfields would be an attractive job, especially with everything that’s happening with the (re)build,’ Seiden stated.

‘We’ve got 18 months of upheaval coming up, but I don’t think Dave was fazed by that - he just wanted a new challenge.

‘We’ll have a board meeting on Thursday and go from there, we’ll advertise the position.

‘We had one email application on Monday night from someone throwing their hat in the ring.

‘We’d like a local manager, and we want to move fairly quickly - who we bring in could decide which players want to stay.

‘None of our players are on contracts - they never have been.

‘If someone wants to leave, they leave.

‘We don’t feel we pay our players enough to hold them to a contract.

Seiden has been at Moneyfields for 16 years, since he started managing the under-8s team featuring his son Dec.

He managed a team through all the youth levels before taking charge of the reserves.

He completed a full set of managing at all levels when he was caretaker boss for one game in 2015 prior to Carter’s arrival.

Seiden replaced Paul Gregory as Moneys chair in September 2018, having been part of a three-man board - Craig Stafford was the third member - who had appointed Carter three years earlier.

He said Carter’s replacement would ‘100 per cent’ need to buy into the club’s youth policy.

‘We haven’t got a big budget so we have to look at that,’ Seiden remarked.

‘Jake Raine and Tyler Giddings were in my youth team, Conor Bailey was in the youth team here.

‘Rhys Lloyd and Danny Burroughs played last year - around five of Dave’s squad came through the youths.’