Guilsfield boss Leonard hopeful of continuing good start

Guilsfield manager Nathan Leonard has been pleased with the start his team has made to the 2017/18 season, and will be hoping they can continue their positive start against Flint Town United this weekend.

Leonard would be entitled to be in buoyant mood after their start to the Huws Gray Alliance season, with the club sitting comfortably in 3rd place. However, despite four wins and a draw out of their opening six, Leonard is far from resting on his laurels and believes there is a lot more to come from his group of players.

“Yes it’s been a pleasing start; the lads have been terrific not just in games but also at training during the week. There’s a great atmosphere in the dressing room and hopefully we can keep improving and stay in the top four. We have areas to work on and there’s still a lot more to come from this group of players.”

Despite a rapid start, the Guilsfied boss claims the side learnt more from their solitary defeat than any of their victories and it will be a lesson he insists will help his side in the long run, as they target a finish in the upper echelons of the table come the season’s end.

“We’ve probably learnt more from that loss than any other game this season. I hate losing and it hurts for a few days after but it in the long run it may have done us a favour. In the game itself we were well in it after 30 minutes creating some good chances but after a great finish by Mensah for their 1st goal we imploded and had a crazy 10 minute spell and were 3-0 down at half time. You can’t gift chances like that to a quality team like Airbus and they punished us and deserved the 3 points.”

No manager is pleased when they are on the end of a defeat, but Leonard was glad his players bounced back after the loss to Airbus, as he got the reaction he so desired against Holyhead.

However, the Guilsfield boss is determined to instil a killer instinct into his side as he wants them to kill sides off in games to ensure there are no repeat results.

“It was a great reaction from the lads. We worked on a few things in training and had a great session which I think we took into the game. We started the game very well; high tempo and they couldn’t match that early on. The only negative really was we should’ve been 2 or 3 up at half time and given ourselves that bit of a cushion we need to kill teams off when we’re on top. Holyhead had a great spell in the 2nd half but we dug deep and showed great character which was perhaps missing the previous week to keep the 2-0 lead. If I’m honest we rode our luck and very lucky to keep a clean sheet but we certainly deserved the 3 points over the 90minutes.”

All focus now turns towards the test against Flint Town United this weekend. It will be the first time Leonard will come up against new Flint boss Andy Holden, and the Guilsfield boss is under no illusions that it will be a tough game. Flint may have only picked up two wins from six, but they are no easy competitors and Leonard has dubbed it a ‘bogey ground’.

“It will be a very tough game they were unlucky in the week against Airbus and we’ll have to be at our best if we want to take anything from the game. They would’ve certainly expected to have more than 8 points after 6 games but they have had a really tough run of fixtures. They’re certainly capable of going on a winning run but I hope that doesn’t start this weekend! It’s a bit of a bogey ground for us aswell; you’ll never get an easy game at Flint I’ve never won their in about 7 tries as a player so I hope that changes as manager!”

Ahead of the trip to their opponents, Leonard will have an almost fully fit squad with only the injured duo Robbie James and Andy Ford set to miss once more.

“Robbie James is still out injured but has started running so he will be back soon. Andy Ford returns but Adam Jenkins is unfortunately away on holiday getting engaged!”

FEATURED IMAGE: Darren Hyland