Speaking to us following our first outing in pre-season the Gaffer said:

First of all, I’d like to thank the fans that have come to Kidsgrove today and showed support to the club and our younger players.

The important thing for me this evening, is that those four first team players got the 45 minutes under their belt which will help them to increase their fitness levels, it also gave us the opportunity to give our younger players some experience playing football against a hardworking and physical side.

It’s a shorter pre-season period and we’ve had to adapt, we’re adapting by protecting some of our players, that doesn’t mean we’re going to grumble about the shorter preparation time, we’re approaching it in a different manner than we usually would.

We’re in the division higher and there’s still a lot of work being done on the training ground and behind the scenes to ensure the club is ready for the start of the season.

This includes recruitment; we’re looking at bringing in several new faces before the window shuts and we’ll continue to keep working hard with that.

We’ve also got an intense trip coming up to Spain where all of the lads will be out there putting in the hard work on and off the pitch.

Last season we found the right mix of high intensity training and bonding time at our pre-season camp and we want to replicate that this season.

Whilst we’re in Spain we will also play against Dundee United in a behind closed doors friendly that will give us another opportunity to ensure that more of the lads get match minutes.

Thank you once again for your support this evening.

Darrell.