Toolstation NCEL Premier Divison
Garforth Town manager Adrian Costello (left)
The season does not end for Adrian Costello and Garforth Town.
Costello wants to work with his players throughout the summer to maintain the superb team spirit he has installed.
“Next year, we’re already looking and our pre-season started three weeks ago,” Costello said.
“We’ve been identifying players that we might be able to get to come and play for us. We’re looking for players to complement what we have, not replace.
“We’re going to take two week’s break and that’s it. We’re going to come back and play five-a-side. We’re not going to have a pre-season straightaway, but we’re going to keep the lads together.
“We have fantastic morale and anyone who wants to play for Garforth can come and play five-a-side with us.”
Costello, in his first senior managerial post, has successfully steered the Miners through their stormiest period since the 2012-13 season. The Beverley-based boss inherited a threadbare squad upon his arrival as previous manager Graham Nicholas had taken six players with him to Ossett Town.
Costello managed to get eleven out for Garforth’s now-famous West Riding County Cup tie victory over Armthorpe Welfare, but that moment of joy is one of few to follow.
Whilst, the team spirit was good, further departures and injuries to key players hampered Garforth’s progress under Costello and they slowly got sucked into the relegation battle.
Potential disaster was recently adverted and Costello said: “I said to (the owners) Brian (Close) and Craig (Bannister) back in November, there is three phases to this.
“One is we have to get players out to play on the pitch and that was the initial thing.
“Secondly we have to bring players in to allow us to have substitutes and to play Saturday-Tuesday. The third phase is to bring in quality.
“We have done that. You remember coming to watch us and seeing us defend so poorly. We defend well now. We have some good defenders, but I will make no bones about it, it has been hard.
“I had eleven players to start with. I won’t complain because I’ve had some good support from people, such as Lee (Ashforth) from Harrogate Railway and Billy (Miller) at Tadcaster.
“I’ve throughly enjoyed it, but it ain’t been easy.”
Garforth host relegated-threatened Armthorpe Welfare for their final game of the season tomorrow.
It great to here but the previous manager installed that morale and team spirit with the players he had.