Alex Nightingale is pleased with how his Swallownest squad is shaping up for the new Toolstation NCEL Division One season.
The former Clipstone and Worksop Town striker, appointed in February, is gearing up for his first campaign in management and he is thrilled with the level of interest from players wanting to play for Swallownest.
Powerful centre-back Liam Flint, the ex-Worsbrough Bridge and Maltby Main man, is the stand-out new name – but he is one of seven additions to the first team.
Former Dronfield Town full-back Luis Afonso-Ferrero has joined, along with 17-year-old Handsworth Reserves star James Woodhouse.
Nightingale has brought centre-midfielder Juninho Blake back to the club and promoted three of the club’s under 21s in forward Taylor Nicholson and midfielders Jamie Goldenburg and Cole Starkey.
“We’ve retained the majority of the squad from last year and added a few faces,” Nightingale told Non League Yorkshire.
“The players we have brought in will add quality to us.
“They’re all energetic, all fit and all good players. We’ve added some youth and added some under 21s as well. They’re done really well so we’ve brought them in.
“We’re looking good and we’re looking fit.
“We have a lot more strength-in-depth and at a training session which was a trialist game there were 26 there so we’re having to almost remove players from the club as opposed to asking players to come.
“I’ve not really invited people to come, we’ve just had a lot of people come.
“I’m happy, but we’re still open to bringing people in. I’ve not necessarily seen anyone I’m after.
“We have a good group, but we could do with someone who is going to add more goals to us.”
Nightingale was drafted in as almost like a fireman back in December to put out the smoke from Jordan Stocks’ bizarre departure.
As interim boss he incredibly guided ‘Nest to a 5-2 demolition of Rossington Main before the league was curtailed early this year.
He was then appointed as the permanent manager after setting out a ‘one club vision’ for the future of the club.
Nightingale followed up his first win with the 3-1 victory at Dinnington Town in Swallownest’s first pre-season friendly of the summer and he was delighted with the progression he saw.
“We’ve started well and we were so disciplined in the Rossington game (in December) and we’ve just vastly improved compared to that now.” he said.
“We went to Dinnington the other day and they’re not a bad side, but no disrespect to them, we just didn’t give them a kick.
“We kept the ball really well and when we didn’t have it we knew when to press, when to drop off, when to have low blocks and when to counter-press.
“We’re getting there and we’re getting intelligent.”
Nightingale previously outlined his vision and ethos for Swallownest to Non League Yorkshire and he says his players have loving the new regime’s approach.
“Coming in (as manager) from being a player and the fact they’re still some lads I played with it could be seen as difficult,” he said.
“We have changed the culture of the club and to be fair to the lads, every single of them have bought into what we want.
“I remember chatting to you last time and I said we wanted the lads to be fitter and more disciplined than we probably have been in the past and they’ve bought into it.
“I don’t mean any disrespect to those who were here before because Jordan and Lloyd (Gelsthorpe) did a good job.
“I’ve brought in a couple of staff members and we do a lot of planning and we provide a lot of detailed information (to the players). We plan ahead, we plan our sessions and we tailor everything to the squad we have now.
“For instance, the lads have bought into doing CrossFit on a Thursday and periodised fitness.
“We wanted everyone to buy into something different and they have.
“Everyone has worked tirelessly over the last six months.
“I had an operation last week so I’m on crutches so we’ve had to adapt so I can coach as I have still been at every session.
“Everyone involved has been great.
“That goes down from kit-man, the three coaches, the board and the players. Everyone has worked really hard and hopefully it will pay off because they deserve some success because of how hard they have worked.
“Hopefully we see some success over time.”
Swallownest visit Kiveton Miners Welfare tonight.
If you have enjoyed reading Non League Yorkshire over the past few months, please consider making a donation to the not-for-profit organisation NLY Community Sport which provides sport for children and adults with disabilities and learning difficulties. CLICK HERE to visit the JustGiving page. There is a video at the bottom of the page showing our work.
NLY Community Sport, run by James Grayson and Connor Rollinson, has always had combatting social isolation at the top of our objectives when running our Disability Football teams.
Our work is playing an important role in reintroducing our players, who have disabilities and learning difficulties, back into society.
We have six teams, a mixture of Junior and Adult teams – Nostell MW DFC, Pontefract Pirates, Selby Disability Football Club and the South Yorkshire Superheroes (Barnsley) – across Yorkshire.
We have enjoyed great success over the past three years. Several of our players have represented Mencap GB in Geneva, including Billy Hobson from Selby and Greg Smith, whose story is quite inspiring.
You can learn more about the organisation HERE and on our Facebook page.
Watch the video below to see highlights from our three years as an organisation. The video was produced for our players at the end of March to remind them of good memories from the last three years.
