Ebbsfleet manager Dennis Kutrieb insists he still loves football in this country despite another unsavoury incident last weekend.

The Fleet’s title-winning German manager was floored in his own technical area by Cheshunt boss Craig Edwards near the end of their 3-0 home win at Stonebridge Road last Saturday.

On the back of two racism incidents with Havant’s then manager Paul Doswell, you could have forgiven title-winning Kutrieb for having enough after three years in England.

But he still loves the passion and emotion of the game in this country.

“That’s one of the reasons why I love to be here,” said Kutrieb. “It’s not always nice, like Saturday, it was nasty to do it.

“But at the end of the day we are all very passionate about our team, about how football goes, about opinions and that’s why I love this country so much.

“Everyone is really passionate about it, the fans, other managers, teams. You can see his team tried hard to get something out of the game but we were relentless and just kept going.

“I’m not too worried, racism is a different story, but everything else I really do like it because that’s what football is about.”

The hope for Ebbsfleet is that with fourth officials deployed in the National League, incidents like the one last weekend are even less likely to occur.

“We will see,” noted the Fleet boss. “It could still kick-off but maybe the fourth official is there to calm things down and make sure nothing can happen.

“I’m not too bothered about it, my focus was on the pitch and I was just concerned about Franklin Domi. When he went down, even with his head he hit the floor because he was gone when there was a head collision.

“Their manager had nothing better to do than to moan at the referee that he stopped the game. This is not good enough.

“Fair play is a big part of the game and you could see where we got the defeat over there how everyone celebrated. Sometimes karma comes and bites you big time, and now they are relegated that’s what happens to you if you’re not humble enough.”

Kutrieb admitted the remarks made by Edwards following their win over Ebbsfleet in the reverse fixture before Christmas - and everything else that happened on the night - served as a reminder to his team ahead of the game.

“I’m always motivated anyway, regardless of what the manager says, but even our boys said in the changing room how much they wanted to win the game,” said Kutrieb.

“It was more how they treated us when we went there, it was maybe the worst experience of the season - not just from the fans but also the management team.

“When I went there for a pre-season game, they even said I had to pay, you can’t watch the game as a scout.

“That doesn’t help you, you need to have massive confidence to behave like that, even I wouldn’t even think to behave like that.

“I always think better behave, better be humble, because it comes back to you at one point. This is obviously what happened on Saturday.”

The win over Cheshunt also saw champions Ebbsfleet reach 100 points for the season.

With two games left, including this Saturday’s trip to Welling, they can still add to that tally.

“I was just thinking about getting promoted as quickly as we could and getting points on the board each week,” said Kutrieb.

“Obviously if someone had told me before the season that we’d get 100 points I would have been more than happy because that’s a remarkable achievement.

“Not many teams will achieve this in their lives, the club’s history and there’s not even many teams in the history of National League South that have done it. This comes down, as we saw last Saturday, to hard work on a daily basis – be there and don’t be too proud or too arrogant and think you’re something special because you won a few games.

“This was maybe the best example, a remarkable achievement to turn up last Saturday already promoted and we made sure we still wanted to win the game. That’s down to the boys, their hard work and to their good mentality.”