Boss Jimmy Cooper has urged his Metropolitan Police side to step up a level despite seeing the Blues return to winning ways at the weekend.

Saturday’s hard-fought 2-1 triumph at Leatherhead ended a run of four successive draws, and re-established the Met in the Ryman South pace-setters.

But Cooper was still far from impressed.

He said: “We did not play well.

“It was a performance that the team cannot be proud of.

“We still need a lot of fine-tuning.

“But we are slowly moving in the right direction.”

The Blues fell behind at Fetcham Grove on Saturday courtesy of a Will Jenkins strike, but bounced back with second-half goals from Rob George and former Tanner Scott Forrester.

And Cooper admitted to being a relieved man.

He added: “It was a very important game for us to win.

“To be fair the game panned out exactly as I thought it would do.

“We always have a tough game at Leatherhead and Saturday was no different.

“The players needed a bit of a talking to at half-time and they responded with two very well-worked goals.”

The three points eased the Met back to fifth in the table, with a game against fellow strong starters Ashford Town to come at the weekend.

But Cooper was quick to shoot down suggestions that he pores over tables and form guides.

Cooper explained: “In all honesty I do not look at league tables, I just look at our fixture list.

“If at the end of the season we do not make the play-offs or go up it will be our fault and nobody else’s.

“So I do not really pay much attention to how others are getting on.”

Met Police’s next three matches: Sep 27 Ashford Town (h), 30 Folkestone Invicta (a), Oct 11 Whitstable Town (h)