Bateman Penn's his thoughts

As always the support on Saturday was exceptional Steve Bateman I was delighted with Saturday's opening run out at Penn & Tylers who competed very well for the 90 minutes and looked after us well with their hospitality afterwards and during the afternoon.

With a number of players still away on holiday, ill or with work commitments I was able to field a mixed side and have a look at a few youngsters and trialists as well as some of our more recognised faces.

I thought we passed the ball well and kept good possession and created a number of chances from both flanks which I hope will be a feature of the way we play this season. I was very pleased with young Jemal in goal, 15 years old and a bright future if he continues to develop as we hope he will and also young Mo Sharif, at 16 years old who looked a real handful out wide and scored a great goal and always looked a threat.

It's always good to get the first game under your belt and this week I expect to see Simon Sweeney, Dean Harper, Roy Gumbs, Chris Herron, Jon Stevenson, Ian Brown and Matt Platt appear for us. Platty is still around for the remainder of this month and will do part of his pre season with us ahead of returning north in August.

Just to clear up one mystery from Saturday, the hatrick scorer in 10 minutes at the start of the 2nd half was Dean Sinclair, younger brother of Steve.

As always the support on Saturday was exceptional and I look forward to seeing a few more of you during this coming week at Holyport and Hillingdon.

Steve