A NEW season kicks-off for Town next week, and manager Richard Fey is aiming for a top 10 Southern League finish – but his main priority? Finishing a season drama free!
Since Richard joined the club for the 2019/20 season, the Covid-19 pandemic has curtailed his two attempts to lead the club through an entire season.
“Personally, I want to complete a season at the club!” said Richard speaking to Melksham News, “I’ve been here three years and I haven’t completed a season yet – it feels like I’ve been here 10 years!
“And then from the club’s point of view – they haven’t had an incident free Southern League season yet – there’s been Covid for the last two seasons, and in the first season, the manager and some players left towards the end.
“So, the aim is to concentrate, and finish this season incident free. I would love to finish top 10 – I think that’s where we should be aiming. But you want to win every game that you go in to. And I’ve said to the lads that we want to try to do what we can to finish top 10 and look to progress.
As the club prepares for their first league match next week, away to Willand Rovers on Saturday 14th August, Town have been busy warming up with a jam-packed pre-season schedule. Recent outings have seen them up against Warminster Town, Chippenham Town and Bradford Town.
“It’s been nice to get out and make sure that we get minutes into the players,” said Richard, “the results are irrelevant. But we have kept four clean sheets out of six, which is really encouraging – that’s something we’ve been working on and spoken to the squad about – keeping that consistency.
“The game against Warminster was really tough, and Warminster put up a good fight. It was a really good game for us to go away from home, win 1-0, keep a clean sheet, and get some minutes into the lads.
“The Chippenham game – the first half I thought we were excellent; we really gave them a tough 45 minutes. And then we made changes for the second half, and they scored two goals, which could have been avoided.
“Against Bradford, the first half was indifferent, we tried a few things that didn’t really come off. But in the second half, we went back to our normal routine and scored three great goals.
“But overall, it’s been really pleasing, it’s been great to get back out there, we have a great atmosphere in the changing rooms – really good lads that we are trying to develop. We’re building a team for the club with the average age of 22, which is really young for Southern League football – but the club needs stability, and that’s what I’m trying to build.”
About the start of the season next week, Richard said, “I can’t wait, it’s really exciting. We’ve first got a coach journey to Willand, and it will be great to get everyone down there – the supporters, the committee, back room staff – all on one journey. We haven’t been able to do it for a while.
“We then have the favourites to win the league, AFC Totton, at home on Tuesday 17th August, and then the FA Cup at home – you can’t ask for a better start as a club, it’s really exciting. I just hope we do ourselves proud and can pick up points early doors and set us on the way to a top 10 finish.”
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