Lovell throws down the gauntlet pre season .

chris who

chris who

Vital Football Legend
With Margate ,Tonbridge Angels .Bromley ,Faversham .Ebbsfleet and Dover all being played on the same days .I believe Lovell has really thrown out a real tough challenge to the players without even taking on a league side .It will be very interesting to see who else we play .Clearly playing Ebbsfleet and Dover will need the squad to really pull together to get two wins whatever the make up of the teams .
Clearly lads will get a real chance over at least 3 games if they play well and are fit 270 minutes possibly more if we fix another match for the night we play Dartford .
 
I don't think wins are important in friendlies but how the players perform individually and as a team
 
Wayne.Kerr said:
I don't think wins are important in friendlies but how the players perform individually and as a team
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Agreed but it will still be a tough ask .A real test for a lot of teenagers .Lovell will be looking for performances by both teams .As will fans .
 
chris who said:
Agreed but it will still be a tough ask .A real test for a lot of teenagers .Lovell will be looking for performances by both teams .As will fans .
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Indeed but fans' expectations often differ from those of the manager. For example, SL may be looking to put into practice what has been tried in training, which may not suit all fans who simply expect a win against teams lower than the Gills in the pyramid.
 
Clearly two games on the same day is designed to get all the squad to have playing minutes under their belts in time for the season start.

Good to see that it won't be the usual two different teams playing 45 minutes each in those friendlies and then being thrust into 90 minute games.
 
Captainreblue said:
Good to see that it won't be the usual two different teams playing 45 minutes each in those friendlies and then being thrust into 90 minute games.
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I've never understood that mentality, perhaps in terms of wanting to give them a chance, but surely if you're trying to settle on a starting 11, it's better to see players play a full 90?
 
Am I the only person on here who gets worried by all the "friendlies" against "lower" opposition? The teams we play against will probably have in them some guys with a need to show that they are good enough to be league players. Cue crunching tackles etc.

Or is it that I still remember what happened to Simon King?
 
Simon King was playing with a injury .He said to me a few days before that pre season game ."I'm am in more pain than any other time in my life".That was after playing just 45 minutes at Weling I think it was .
He was i would guess willing to play .Hoping perhaps the pain was because of lack of fitness etc .It generally has not been bad tackles against local sides that have caused injury .There was that one of two games in France of course .Injuries pre season have often been down to the preparation for a new season and often would have happened regardless of opposition .
 
It's a pretty much identical list of friendlies to the ones we play every single season, minus the glamorous home game against the likes of Ipswich.

This idea that every side below us in the pyramid are a bunch of vicious cloggers hell bent on injuring our players is a tad anachronistic.
 
If I recall correctly, it was a tackle against Bromley that sidelined King. But I agree Herr and Chris that such injuries are rare (as are lower league cloggers - though both do exist). It's just that I always breathe a sigh of relief when the friendlies are over and the squad has got through them.
 
Pretty standard to have a sequence of Friendly games which are incremental in opposition quality. However, it would be good for team and fans to have two or three home games v high profile Championship or Premiership teams - especially when GFC is so (geographically) close to a bucket load of them !
 
"Back in the day" we always seemed (in my memory) to play 2 or 3 v local non-league. Then 1 (maybe 2) v div 3 or 4 opposition and finally a "decent" game v a south east div1 or 2 team. ie Charlton, Palace, Milwall, Ipswich etc.

Or am I imagining that? It could be we played a heap more non-league but I just didn't register them.

Must be a statto out there who has all our pre-season games dating back to the 70's surely...
 
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