City of Liverpool manager Michael Ellison says he is hoping to get off to a good start in the Northern Premier League with a win over Ramsbottom on Saturday.
The Purps kick off their season at their new home, Vauxhall Motors’ VanEupen Arena, after Ellison embarked on his first full pre-season at the helm, this summer.
He is eyeing an opportunity to get points on board as early as possible with an opening day win on Saturday.
Their pre-season preparations were far from ideal with multiple cancellations including the postponement of their final warm-up against Bamber Bridge.
As well as Runcorn Linnets and Marine to name a few, Bootle and Warrington Rylands have been added to the Northern Premier League West, as part of the upward movement, something which will add “spice” to the clashes, Ellison admits.
“We’re happy to go into the season as we are. We want to compete, the expectation now is to take every game as it comes, it’s a cliché and everyone says.
“If you start looking too far ahead and putting things on it then things will get away from you so we’ll just concentrate on Saturday’s game and have one or two declared fit that will give us a little boost but we’re solely, solely focused on Ramsbottom.
“It’s a new looking squad, we inherited a really good squad last season and we had a bit of stop and start then.
“A lot of lads have left for different reasons, but that was always happens. It’ll take a bit of time for lads to get used to what we want to do, we tried to implement that into the training and in our friendlies we seen positive signs for that, I think it’s all about the start.
“If you can get a good performance on Saturday, things just develop from there and get a bit of momentum, but that will be something every manager is hoping for come Saturday.
“That’s the idea [to get off to a winning start], that’s what you want to do, it isn’t always possible.
“We want to get off to a good start, the quicker you can get those three points under your belt the better it is, the Ramsbottom manager will be thinking the same thing we’ll have to be at it on Saturday.
“The good thing is there’s less travelling, more local games and that brings it’s own test. They’re all local teams, ones we know well and so do both sets of players which will add a bit of spice to the games so I think it’ll be tough, everyone will be trying to beat everyone.
“We’re always confident, you have to be, I think you have to believe in what you’re trying to do.
“Preparations have been tough, we know what to expect, I know they have brought a couple of signings, you have to believe in what you want and will want to implement that on Saturday.”
(Featured image by Paul Moran)
