Two goals in the first eighteen minutes were enough to ensure victory for Bromley at Welling United in a pre season friendly but the Wings supporters will have been heartened by an encouraging display.

“It was a good performance, a very good performance” enthused Welling manager Steve Lovell. “It’s the last pre-season game and we’ve learned a lot about the squad that we’ve got and the team that we’ve got and after the first two goals went in today against Bromley, I thought that we played really, really well.

“It’s just that we started very sluggishly and allowed them two bad goals really.” he continued “but apart from that, I thought we were excellent. We had most of the possession, created a lot of chances, their keeper made a lot more saves than our keeper so it was decent, a decent performance.

“It was bad defending. We’ve given away bad goals but the pleasing thing for me was how they bounced back after the two goals. They didn’t drop their heads. They worked hard and got back in the game and created loads and loads of chances.”

In the second half, Lovell introduced some further trialists, many of whom impressed. Lovell was pleased and said “We’ve had them on the radar for a while and it was a matter of getting them in and having a look and they did very well as well.

“It was nice to get them off the bench to show what they can do. Hopefully, they’ll be able give us something extra that we need going into the season.”

Although only eleven players have been announced as having signed so far, Lovell confirmed that further news was imminent. “We should have 17 or 18 players on our books that will be available (for Havant and Waterlooville away next Saturday).” he confirmed.. “All of them will have been out here playing today that you’ve seen.”

Now that Lovell has decided on his squad, training is geared to preparing for the game at Havant. Lovell confirmed “We tried to do the things that we worked on in training about switching play and so on, and that was good. The boys really worked hard and gave everything so that’s the main thing.”

Stefan Ilic scored Welling’s goal coming back following illness. Lovell said “He’s a little bit behind at the moment but he’ll be important for us as the season goes on”

The friendlies have finished and it’s all go for the start of the season. Lovell is looking forward to it and said “It’s a good squad and a good bunch of lads and something that we can work with.”

Picture supplied by Dave Budden.