Farncombe FC look to a new season

As teams return to training and pre-season friendlies, Farncombe Town FC is looking forward to the new season.

The squad kicked off their pre-season friendlies with a 1-1 draw against Rudgwick on August 1st.

There will be several new additions to the squad, with several players trying out for the club, and club secretary Mark Oyler says hopes are high for a productive season.

"It was really just a first runout for the team this season," he said of the Rudgwick game.

"There were five or six from last year's squad, plus triallists."

For all clubs, the pre-season has been a tricky period to navigate.

"We planned our pre-season friendlies a while back and had to reschedule the whole lot of them," Mark said.

"We scheduled them back in July, but obviously we had to wait until the FA guidance came out before we could play them."

The Coronavirus pandemic has proved disruptive to the Meade's Park club, in common with all others, and changes have had to be made to procedures before the new season kicks off. The brakes came off on August 1st, and it has been full speed ahead with training and friendlies since then.

"We had been doing some training before then, in line with the FA guidelines and taking the government's advice in what we were allowed to do," Mark explained.

One big change for the team has been the decision to split the Premier Division of the Woking & Guildford Alliance League, in which the club plays, into two geographic north and south divisions.

Farncombe will play in the South section, along with their big derby rivals, Shalford. The change has been made to limit travelling time for the teams, as sport grapples with the fallout from the pandemic. It's going to be a season of change for the club, not least in terms of the matchday lineup. "We are looking to bring some new blood in this season," Mark said, adding that the club was looking to sign up some of the triallists who ran out for the Rudgwick game. "We are still looking for some more players, because this is quite a challenging time to recruit. We are hoping to try some more players out before the season starts," Mark adds. When that start will be of course, is still uncertain: it could be towards the end of September: possibly the 25th. "It's not 100% confirmed, but that's what we are working towards," he says. Under manager Tom Piatek the squad is hoping to improve on its mid-table finish of last season. "We had a very, very good first half last season and then we started to back off a bit in February, and then the season was brought to a halt in mid-March," Mark explained. "We feel we could have ended up a couple of positions higher if we had been able to play all our games. "I think we can definitely improve. We're getting better every season. This is the season where we can hopefully push for promotion." Games, including tomorrow's friendly against FC Farncombe, are still being held behind closed doors, but you can follow the club's fortunes by visiting the website You can also find Farncombe FC on Facebook and Twitter @farncombefc