Skegness boss happy with progress

The Lilywhites returned to training last week and then drew 1-1 at home to March Town on Saturday in their opening friendly, Gary King with a late equaliser.

And Rawlinson believes things will gradually fall into place on all fronts.

He said: ​”It has been a pleasing start to pre-season with good numbers at all sessions and the lads have come back in great shape so we can now to begin to work on the football side of things rather than just endless fitness work.

"We are getting our physio, Jamie, more involved in the activation and recovery side and the lads have responded well to that. We want to do things properly and hopefully these improvements will be seen on the pitch.

"Saturday’s game was a mixed bunch, we had several lads away which happens in pre-season so ended up with people having more minutes than they should have and against good opponents who were ahead of us in their pre-season plans and that showed in the first-half.

“We are trying to have a couple of plans shape-wise and the first-half one didn't really work in terms of being on the ball against that of our opponents, although we did create some good opportunities, We then changed at half-time to deal with their threats and in the second-half we were the better side and whilst results don't matter it was good to not get beaten.”

Rawlinson also spoke about new signing James Hugo, adding: “I have worked with James before and is a wonderfully gifted left-sided player. He has been out for a while with an injury so we have to be careful how we use him, but in time he will be a vital addition.”

Skegness are back in action this weekend when NPL Division One East side Belper Town come to the Vertigo Stadium for a 1pm kick-off on what will be a double-header with the two clubs’ women’s teams playing each other afterwards.

Cleethorpes Town will then be the visitors three days later.

Rawlinson said: “It will be a really tough game but should be a great event with the women's teams also playing them. It will all be about performances really and how we match up to an established non-league side, all in all through it is great that clubs such as Belper will visit us and shows just how far as a club we have come in such a short time.”