Dover Athletic got back to winning ways on Tuesday evening with a 3-2 victory in a close encounter with Purfleet. As expected Dover were boosted by the addition of a new striker, 34-year-old Keith Scott, a veteran of hundreds of Premiership and Football League games.

In the absence of Matt Carruthers, who was injured in Thursday's defeat against Millwall, Craig Etherington played right-back with Jake Leberl in a midfield holding role. Scott was handed the number 9 shirt and he was partnered in attack by John Elliot.

The match started fairly evenly with some neat football, particularly from Lee McRobert and Keith Scott, but no attempts on either goal until the fifteenth minute when Athletic took the lead with a little bit of good fortune and a wonderful piece of skill. A Purfleet clearance was inadvertently chested into the path of John Elliot by the referee. Elliot advanced a few paces before curling a sweet left-footed shot right into the top corner of the net from 25 yards leaving the Purfleet keeper helpless.

The home side responded immediately and forced Paul Hyde into a low save at the other end. There were no further additions to the score before half-time despite some good football from both sides. Athletic looked more organised than they did in the drubbing against Millwall and in midfield in particular they looked impressive. It would be no suprise if Gary Bellamy chose to start the season with the quartet he fielded in this match. Lee McRobert and Niall Inman looked dangerous down the flanks, whilst in the centre Jake Leberl and Jamie Day complemented each other well, being both solid and creative.

The Whites made no changes at half-time and they soon had their lead cancelled out when Paul Linger netted in the 46th minute.

The scores were not level for long however as Athletic regained the lead three minutes later when Keith Scott converted from close range. Purfleet were not about to lay down and die though and they kept probing at Dover's defence and were rewarded with another equaliser on 57 minutes, again through Linger.

On the hour mark Gary Bellamy made four changes, withdrawing Etherington, Shearer, Day and Elliot. They were replaced by Jimmy Strouts, Sammy Okafor, Danny Hockton and a new face at right-back.

Strouts and Hockton were particularly impressive. Both are looking much sharper than they did at the start of the pre-season campaign, with the former also proving his critics wrong and looking entirely at home with the new brand of passing football, not misplacing a pass all evening. It was through Hockton that Dover scored their third and ultimately decisive goal, and it rivalled Elliot's opener in terms of quality. With the ball at his feet outside the Purfleet area, there seemed no way through to goal but he accelerated and skipped past two challenges before unleashing a ferocious shot that smashed into the underside of the crossbar and dropped over the line. Again the goalkeeper was not given a chance.

It was not all one-way traffic and Purfleet were handed an opportunity to level the scores for a third time when Jake Leberl fouled in the area. A spot-kick was awarded but Paul Hyde was untroubled as the ball cleared the bar by some distance.

In the end the score was a fair reflection of a game that was a good test for the Whites against decent non-league opposition. Whilst the top Conference sides are likely to be less forgiving when it comes to punishing mistakes (Dover gave the ball away in front of their back four too often in this match), Athletic can take heart that they are slowly improving as a unit and beginning to look less like eleven individuals and more like a team.

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