Cray Wanderers start their Isthmian Premier League campaign this weekend with a tough looking trip to face Wingate & Finchley but with boss Tim O’Shea looking forward to another campaign which will see the Cray boss hit a significant personal milestone! 

“I can’t wait to get back into the season,” the Cray boss confessed. “I’m another year older at sixty this year in November, but by this time of the year I think most managers and players will tell you the same thing that they’re fed up with all the running and the pre-season games and finally getting down to the nitty gritty of the League!” 

“I left school to take up a full-time opportunity at Spurs when I was fifteen/sixteen years of age which means that I guess that this will be around pre-season number forty-five post two hip replacements and a double hernia operation just a couple of weeks ago, you could say it’s taken its toll!” O’Shea added “grimacing”! 

“Sadistically, I still do enjoy pre-season – I like to see players in pain!” The Cray boss went on. 

 “They can’t kid a kidder, and I know what they are going through because I was there, and I know that these days a lot of the players take on what the pros do and in theory they should be. Maybe they are having ten days complete rest but at that time they should be doing their bit to make it easier pre-season!  

“Back in my day, Monday came and you told yourself that you’d start the following week, you’d tell yourself that you’d do it the next Monday, and before you knew where you were, you’re in the middle of pre-season and you wondered why you couldn’t move after session number one!” 

“Thankfully I have noticed the improvement in our players since they returned this time. We gave them a tough one and they have attacked it. I always said to my players that if its good enough for Premier League players or Championship clubs, then its good enough for us so let’s have a go at it! 

“Times might be a bit slower (in the tests) but let’s have a go. It’s tough and we just have to get it done – they might only be with you two nights a week, but seriously the boys have to these days be doing other stuff as well!” 

Cray missed out on play-off football last year and will be fancied to go close again this year, and we wondered if that would put more pressure on the boss? “First and foremost, we are looking to improve this year as I think most sides are, but honestly nothing has been mentioned within the club.  

“There is still a lot going on around the place, they’ve just opened new Padel Courts at the ground and there is more talk about other bits being “bolted” on as well.  

“The two guys – Gary Hillman and Mike Paye are still busy getting the infrastructure right within the outside of the ground so to speak, and I think once that is in place, they might be talk of trying to get into play-offs and get promoted that sort of thing, but as a club we are still moving along nicely and as long as we can have a good a season as we had last year… if we finish where we did last season (in seventh) we will be in the play-offs because of their expansion!” 

“Saturday, we start at Wingate & Finchley,” O’Shea said looking ahead. “It’s a journey and a tough place to go, we know that and we know that we’ll be facing a good side who notoriously always seem to be at the right end of the table, so I am sure that they will look at the fixture and think that it’s a good one to start with for them.  

“We will go there after prepping in training this week and I know that all the players will be keen to start the real business!”