FIXTURES

On Saturday 14 July a Hitchin Town XI will play at Stotfold kick off 3.00pm while on Wednesday 17 July a Hitchin Town XI will play Sandridge Rovers at The Arena kick off 6.45pm in pre- season friendlies.

Monday 16 July Hemel Hempstead Herts Charity Cup Final (2016/17) at Berkhamsted kick off 7.45pm. The address of the ground is Lower Kings Road, Berkhampsted, HP4 2AL. Admission prices are £12 adults and £6 concessions.

PLAYER NEWS

In the close season both Lucas Kirkpatrick and Jay Dowie have undergone knee operations. Both are now starting training and will hopefully be available early in the league season.

Ben Walster has left and is expected to join Chesham.

Kevin Byrne has returned to America.

NEW SIGNINGS

Hitchin have signed striker Ezra Forde. He is 19 and played nearly 50 games for Oxford City In the National League South over the last two seasons.

Another new signing is Lewis Ferrell. He is a defender and last season played at St Ives and Farnborough. Previously he had played in the National League South for Staines, Hayes and Yeading and Farnborough.

CIDER AND CHEESE FESTIVAL

Please come along to our Cider and Cheese Festival which is taking place on Saturday and Sunday from 12.00pm at Canary Club. Over 40 ciders are available and there will also be live music. Entrance is just £4 and more details can be found on the website.

LUTON TOWN

I would like to thank Luton Town for sending their full first team squad to Top Field last Friday. I was very happy with our performance and the levels of fitness the players showed as we had had only three training sessions before the game. We still have five weeks of pre-season to go to reach full fitness and to sharpen the players up.

As for the game certain players had not met the rest of the squad before so all in all I thought it was a good exercise and it was good to see a healthy attendance.

BOREHAM WOOD

On Tuesday I elected to play two separate teams to ensure 95% of the players played at least 45 minutes. As I said above it is very early in the pre-season and we have to manage playing minutes for players to avoid injuries.

Once again I was happy with the performance against Boreham Wood’s full first team squad. I see plenty of potential in the squad and am looking forward to more time on the training field to hone their potential.

HEMEL HEMPSTEAD

The long awaited Herts Charity Cup Final has finally arrived as we travel to Berkhamsted on Monday. We face our third stern test in ten days as we face a Hemel Hempstead team who had an excellent season by reaching the National League South play-offs only losing out on penalties. They have subsequently signed a number of quality players and it is clear their intention is to go for promotion again.

I hope to see as many fans as possible come along as we try and win some silverware.

Roy Izzard