Louis Axcell cannot wait to be back managing in a competitive environment as he prepares to lead Maltby Main into the mouth-watering FA Cup extra-preliminary round battle with Handsworth.
The tie is the stand-out fixture for the games involving NCEL clubs because of the many connections between the sides.
Several clubs have played for both sides, while Axcell used to manage Handsworth’s reserves team and Ambers boss Russ Eagle is from Maltby and managed the club in the early 2000s.
The clash at Muglet Lane will be the first competitive game both clubs have played since March and Axcell believes that will add extra motivation for both sets of players.
“It is a great fixture for South Yorkshire because it is a fixture people want to see,” Axcell told Non League Yorkshire.
“I have a lot of ties to Handsworth and so do a lot of our players so it adds to the occasion. There’s a few ex-Handsworth players in my squad, but in this area there’s quite a few clubs so players do tend to move around clubs. There’s also the people on the committee so yeah it will be a good occasion.
“I’m looking forward to seeing people and hopefully with fans now allowed to come in there should be a few there as there’s plenty of local people interested in both clubs. I think we have both recruited well. Handsworth have signed some good players and I feel we have strengthened.
“Hopefully it will a good game involving hopefully two of the stronger sides in the Division. It will be a good test to see where we’re at. I don’t think I’m going to have to say a lot. Not because it is against Handsworth, but it is because we haven’t had a competitive game for so long.
“That’s for players on either side. Everyone is going to be dying to get out there. Whoever we had played it would have been the same thing, purely because of the last five or six months. I’m just looking forward to getting in the dugout and seeing a competitive game where the result at the end of the game counts.”
Axcell left Handsworth in 2018 to become Scott Mason’s assistant at Maltby. When Mason departed late last year Axcell replaced him as manager – his first number one position in Non League Football.
Axcell admits the Handsworth experience has helped him get to where he is today.
“It was a great learning curve,” he said.
“I was assistant manager of Worksop Parramore when the clubs merged and then I went to the reserves to work with Dave Totty who was a stalwart of the club.
“I was only young and I was able to learn my trade with the County Senior team. I was first involved when we won the County Senior League Prem with a team of an average age of about 18 or 19 (in 2014). That was definitely the high point and I probably have five players from that squad in and around the (Maltby) squad this season.
“Coaching always my first thing so that kind of evolved into management as we have gone on. It is something I’m really happy about as I love being a manager and being involved in Non League Football. It (Handsworth) definitely stood me in good stead to where I am now.”
The FA Cup fixture kicks off the competitive season, but Maltby and the rest of the NCEL have to wait until either the 19th or 22nd for their league campaigns to start.
The NCEL season was meant to begin on the 5th. That was put back as at the time there was doubt over whether spectators would be allowed into ground and Axcell agrees the uncertainty has made pre-season hard.
“It has been difficult,” he said.
“As soon as we got a start date we got our friendlies in place and we built it up. When the season was delayed and there was talk of a second spike you’re kind of thinking to yourself ‘are we going to have another month (delay)’?
“It would have been difficult for players and managers because you set yourself to that date to get yourself ready. It put a cloud over it, but now with the supporters allowed in gradually and there’s now a definite date, we just want to get going.”