Frickley Athletic manager Spencer Fearn speaks to Non League Yorkshire’s James Grayson about his hopes for the season, his pre-season training methods and how well the first pre-season training session went.
Evo Stik Division One South
Frickley Athletic manager Spencer Fearn
Spencer Fearn is making no promises about how well Frickley Athletic will do in the next ten months.
The new Frickley manager has made a string of eye-catching signings since taking charge of the Westfield Lane team.
The likes of Gavin Allott, John Cyrus, Jameel Ible and Jacob Hazel are four of many. But despite his excellent recruitment, Fearn is not getting carried away.
“We’ve really happy with how we have recruited,” Fearn told Non League Yorkshire.
“We have got some old favourites back at the the club.There’s also some lads who are making the step-up, but are more than capable of playing in the Evo Stik.
“I can’t just wait to get going. The first four or five weeks were a bit of a whirlwind as we were recruiting a large number of players. It is going to be a very new side as there’s only Seb (Malkowski) who is staying on.
“Tyler Wiliams was meant to be signing, but he’s got an opportunity to go on trial at a Conference North club which is fair enough and we wish him the very best of luck as he attempts to move up the pyramid
“There’s some good players at this club and we want to have a good go next season. It’s about performances ultimately and if we put the performances in, the results take care of themselves.
“We’re going to take one game at a time. No predictions and just the promise that we will give it our all.”
Frickley started pre-season training on Monday, more than a week before their first friendly.
The session was based 90% with a football, which differs from a lot of schedules.
Explaining his philosophy, Fearn said: “The fancy name for the method we use is called periodisation, which is building football fitness over a longer period throughout pre-season.
“It’s a game of turns, sprints, jumps so that is what we focus on and this method helps prevent any non-impact injuries such as muscle tears if it is done right. It also gets the players very fit.
“It’s also more enjoyable for the players when they have a ball at their feet.”
The session was full of high energy, a lot of football drills and laughter and Fearn was pleased.
“I thought the group of lads bonded really well, had a good crack, worked hard and you can see already that they are a great set of lads,” he added.
“We are looking forward to working with all of them in the season ahead.
“Our focus is getting them ready for the Gainsborough Trinity game on 8th July which will be a great test and also gives us the opportunity to look at some of our under 19’s and those on trial a bit closer.
“Overall we have a good squad in place and there’s plenty of competition for places. We’ll run with a squad of 18/19 and we are all looking forward the fixtures coming out over the next few weeks.
“We cannot wait to get started.”