Maidstone manager Hakan Hayrettin saw Alfie Pavey produce the perfect response to being dropped.

Pavey was left out of United’s starting XI at Chelmsford, with Christie Pattisson - a winger by trade - preferred up front for Saturday’s trip to Essex.

But the striker, who suffered a serious knee injury at former club Barnet, headed an 85th-minute winner with his first touch as Hayrettin’s side triumphed 2-1.

“It’s all well and good the manager taking the accolades when he makes the substitution but credit to Alfie Pavey, he’s come on and done his job,” said Hayrettin.

“It was his first touch of the ball and I’m happy for him.

“He’s had a hard, hard time. I’ve left him out today because I wanted to go with Christie.

“He’s had bad injury after injury so he’s got to work hard, he knows that, but I’m pleased for him. You saw his response to being left out.”

Hayrettin had been preparing to introduce Michael Phillips for Roarie Deacon, with assistant boss Terry Harris suggesting a point would be a good result after Charlie Sheringham struck in the last 10 minutes to cancel Dominic Odusanya’s opener.

But the manager changed his mind, going for Pavey, and it paid off spectacularly.

Hayretin said: “Terry left it up to me to make the decision.

“I thought about it and I was going to put Michael Phillips on for a straight swap with Roarie but I just had this little thing in me that if we get the ball in the box he might score, and he did, and fair play to him.”

Maidstone were good value for the points in bagging back-to-back victories at the start of a season for the first time since the Isthmian Premier title campaign of 2014/15.

Chelmsford had their moments, and looked set to take a point after Sheringham pounced on George Elokobi’s mistake for the leveller, but the hosts could have no complaints.

“I thought were the better team after the first 10 minutes,” said Hayrettin.

“At half-time, if I was their manager, I’d probably be saying, ‘Look, the door is still open here, we’ve got a chance,’ but we ground them down.

“In George Elokobi we’ve got a fantastic captain, a fantastic leader, he’s made a mistake, he’s held his hands up, but we showed great character to come back and win the game.

“It was tight but we could have had more - we should have had three or four.

“If we hadn’t come away with three points I would probably say we were hard done by, we deserved to win, but the character and discipline we showed to get back in and win the game was good.

“You’re never going to dominate a game for 90 minutes, and I thought there was a little period where we didn’t do our jobs and we could have come undone.

"But if you look at the chances we’ve had, just on chances, we should have won.

“I’m so pleased for the supporters. It’s an amazing feeling to win, isn’t it?

“It doesn’t matter what level, or where you are. This is a good club and this is a good team and I think we did well today.”

• Match report: Chelmsford 1-2 Maidstone

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