Box Hill United traveled to Lakeside Stadium for their first pre-season friendly against dual NPL Premiers South Melbourne.
A solid session delivered the opportunity for coach Greg Kassidas to put the squad through its paces.
Kassidas spoke about how the pre-season efforts were starting off at the club, who will be hunting for promotion in 2016.
“We’ve had two weeks of training now so six sessions under our belt. This is our first hit out and we’ve got about ten new players on the pitch,” he said.
“It was good to have a hit out and see some of the new boys and where they are at and how they fit into our mold. I’m quite happy with how the team played. The result today doesn’t matter, I’m just happy with how they went about it. After only being training together for six sessions I think it’s been good.”
The squad at Box Hill has remained relatively stable but a variety of new faces have joined the locker room at Wembley Park, including some youngsters set to make an impact in the senior set-up.
Two of those new faces set to line up for United next season are former Melbourne Knights midfielder Alex Dao and the returning Michael Gerace, who both featured in the 2-2 draw against South Melbourne.
“Thomas Simos is one of the boys who has come into the senior squad. He’s been at the club for three years,” Kassidas said.
“He missed all of last year with a total knee reconstruction and he got called in today by default. He wasn’t scheduled to play today at all, however he played the last 30 minutes and scored a goal.
“He did really well. There are another couple of new boys that have come up from within the club and the balance have come to us from various clubs. However the nucleus of the starting eleven from 2015 is still here, that’s a positive and it’s good to keep consistency.
“There’s only two less players, one is overseas and the other is trialing at an NPL club.”
Kassidas spoke broadly about the necessity of player fitness and the growth of strength and conditioning, especially as players return to the club having had a few months off.
He views friendly matches as a critical component of the pre-season and one aspect that is essential to getting the match feel into players’ legs.
“It’s always nice to come out of any match with the score in your favour, but during pre-season that doesn’t matter. It’s part of preparation, you have to play these matches,” he said.
“You can see what the team and players do and don’t do on the pitch. Are they following the instructions? Are they embracing the philosophy?
“I like to play as many from the squad as I can and then make the little changes I need to in order to follow what we believe is the way we want to play football”.
In terms of vision for the team and club in 2016, Kassidas indicated it is a controlled and measured focus on successful football, which will hopefully bring them league success.
“As a club we want to finish as high as possible. As players and coaches we want to win the league, so that’s what we are going to try and do.”
Box Hill United will start the 2016 NPL2 season travelling to The Grange Reserve to take on Kingston City on Monday 22nd February, kick-off at 8:30pm.