 Brought to you by DIS, keeping companies connected with cloud-based solutions. Come on, City! We're, what now, two days away from the new league campaign. How ready are you as a side going into that game against Colchester? Yeah, we think we had a meeting this morning. We've had a real positive pre-season, both on the training ground and the games we've played, got a lot out of it. Again, we're fortunate tomorrow, as we were last Saturday, to go into the game with almost a fully-fixed squad. Young Connor, Chance, got a knock through the night, but so easy unavailable. But other than that, we're fully-fixed squad ready to go. Naturally, Levi misses out again with his suspension, which carries on. But no, we, listen, you always feel prepared. Obviously, we'll see what happens when the game kicks off. No, we've had a really good positive week since last Saturday's victory at Bolton, carried on with the good performance at Doncaster. Another good training session today, and really looking forward to the game, naturally. How bad, firstly, is the knock on Connor Shanks? Well, he got a knock. Obviously, you saw the game the other night, and then he carried on. It was a little bit so, sent for an extra yesterday, and everything's all clear. So, just a few days for him, a little bit of so on us. As a kid making his debut, he just wanted to stay on as long as he could. So, yeah, nothing too serious, which is good. In terms of team selection, how close and how similar will it be in terms of players and shape to the win at Bolton? Well, if you think I'm just going to tell you, and you can send it to Colchester United Manager, that my team is going to be, and my shape is going to be, you are severely wrong. Obviously, we played a different shape last Saturday at Bolton. We had a different shape. We were going to play on Tuesday night against Doncaster, but it changed it at the last minute to another one. So, the lads will have no doubts how we want to go once we go through the team and the formation tomorrow. But as we've mentioned them today, even in the same formation, it can be a different person now. We can maybe play it a different way, or likewise we can play a different formation. So, we'll always have a little look at the opposition and where we think where we can hurt them the most and where we can get the better out of the game. We knew last week it would almost a match-up with Bolton, like for like, as was almost the other night against Doncaster. So, yeah, with horses for courses always has been with us, but, you know, we've worked on a couple of formations throughout pre-season and we're ready to go in whatever way we may shape up. I suppose the follow-up to that is with the younger players being used on Tuesday, whether or not any of those have staked the claim and pushed themselves into your thinking for the squad on Saturday. Yeah, good question. They're always in the thoughts, but as I would say, not only the young players of the night or since we came back, all the other lads have stepped up. The ones that we've not seen a lot of prior, as I said before, the lads that were on loan last season, Jackson Longridge, Tyler French, Sam Hormby, have come in and all worked well in training. And the other lads that missed out the other night didn't start in the game on Bolton came in and did a good job as well. So, we've got a healthy competition at this moment and the young lads are pushing everyone for a stake to be in the squad. Just in terms of that game more generally on Saturday, I realise it's going to be a game without fans at Valley Parade, but how nice is it in, I suppose, gradual steps to have professional football back out at the ground? Yeah, brilliant. Yeah, obviously we've had two trials there with the friendlies that we've had against Wigan and Doncaster, and both from a non-perspective football perspective went well. You know, little differences naturally. We can only get 12 or 14 in the home dressing room, so the other subs have got to change where the staff used to get changed. I think we are in the laundry room now. But yeah, there's little differences naturally, but the fact that we're having to be able to go out and play is great. Obviously the next step is to get limited crowds in and then the dream, hopefully that won't be too far down the road, would be to get Valley Parade rocking again with over 10, 15,000. But at the moment, it is what it is, and I think every one of us is just looking forward to getting out there at Valley Parade and putting in a strong performance. I suppose, this might not be a question for yourself, Stuart, but with everything that's happened in the last 24, 48 hours that we've seen from the government and DCMS and the like, and there's concerns now that that early to mid-October date that they've set out of fans being welcomed back into grounds could be pushed back. How aware of you are you as a club as a manager of that situation? Yeah, we had a word with our lads again this morning. I went in the meeting room, which is a canteen, but meeting room and it's still socially distanced. We've got to be mindful of that even though we're back playing now. So we've got a responsibility to ourselves in our bubble, if you like, and then when they go away from the football club to a date of the rules. I think it's pretty simple, but what the government is now asking, I know there's complexities about how many people can go in each of these houses, et cetera, et cetera, but just follow the rules. Follow the rules if you're in a wear a mask, keep your social distances, wash your hands. I think we all should be regulars in that now. I'm not one for raves, so I won't get caught up with mixing in more than six people, right, and I've probably got that many friends that I may need to be in a company of more than six, but I think if you just stick to the rules, stick to the guidelines, but I know obviously the racing from Doncaster got curtailed after just one day, and rightly so, I think, if indications are there that things are spiking, then we've got to stay on top of things. Slightly disappointing, but if things are done right, I think we'll still have, hopefully, we'll have fans back in the stadium soon. Yes, certainly, fingers crossed on that. Just on the league campaign itself, you said that you've met ahead of the game at Colchester, no doubt you've spoken about the league more generally, and the ambitions and targets that you have this season, is the play-off a must for you? No, not at all. Our ambition is to be competitive in every game. It's a short-term ambition at this moment in time. Our ambition is inside the dressing room, inside the football club will stay there, but we just want to be as successful as we can. Be the best we can every day today in training, in games, give your maximum, be the absolute best we can be, not set any long-term targets and goals, because then you build yourself up, but we know what our focus is and our positive vibe is going to be, and we're going to maintain that. If Colchester is opponents, do you view them as potential promotion-placed team given their exploits last season? Yes, I certainly think I've watched the game at Dredin last week, where they beat 3-1 in the cup, and they won 0-up right until half-time, a second before half-time, and performed really well, looked dangerous. Three fast attacking players at the top, and then I watched the game against Portswood through the night, where they were holding their own until they lost a bit of a soft goal, and got beat 2-0. So, I've seen enough of them to know what the threats are. Yes, obviously they got to play off last season, changed the manager, brought some new faces in, as most clubs have, but I think it'll be an exciting game, because I think they'll be coming with the firepower they've got to try to win the game. But it might be a different game, I would imagine, to what Bolton was and to what Doncaster was. We've just got to focus on yourselves how we want to play the game. We've run through it again today, and we'll obviously emphasise the points tomorrow. But I think it's going to be a game where it could be end-to-end, it could be an open game, because we know how we want to start. And as I said, I think Colchee has performed well, even though they've been knocked out with two defeats in the cup games. They'll be happy with the performance, I'm sure of that. Good luck for Saturday's day, Stuart, thanks for your time. Tia, thank you. When you talk about having seen Colchee's cup game last Saturday, presumably most of your scouting on opposition is now done by technology rather than actually at games. Yes, it has been. But we've now managed to get to some of the other part-time verses to go cover a game for us, and we've got one of our staff that will cover a game. So we got, for example, the other night, we got Lincoln watched. We didn't have anyone to go that far down to Portsmouth. We couldn't have been that unfair, sending somebody to Portsmouth. Sorry, Simon. So we never had any watching Colchee's game, but as you said, I've watched the game this morning on the iPad, and we know plenty about it, and that's for sure. And just going back to Covid restrictions and the like, has what's happened with England, has that been the sort of, not necessarily a wake-up call, but a reminder to young players that they do have to abide by the rules? Yeah, I think, listen, I think everybody filming outside football, inside football, were quite surprised, you know, disappointed really in what happened. I'm sure the boys are themselves, you know, it's something they'll be embarrassed about for a long, long time. But yeah, I mean, anything that flags up like that is a reminder and a wake-up call to everyone. You know, just, it's not a difficulty, you know, just to stick to what you're asked to do. You know, you can still enjoy yourself off a part without breaking rules, there's no doubt about that. So yeah, and I think, you know, things like that happen and it comes into the public eye then, it is a wake-up call for everyone just to adhere to the rules, as we say. And staying with international football, have you been pleasantly surprised by how well Scotland have done over the last couple of games? Yeah, I think, well, they're on their hiding to nothing in the second game against the Czech Republic because obviously they had almost, I think, 12 or 13 debutants because they got caught up with the Covid themselves and they had to play an entirely new squad. So anything other than a Scotland victory would have been seen north of the board as a disaster really. So they managed, they got the job done, they're on their hiding to nothing, as I say, because they were expected to win. And even in the game previously against Israel, they did okay. So I think there's more to come from them. I think they're getting, they look to side, they've got better players now. There's a lot more players playing in the English Premier League and playing, you know, top-level football and with Torg as well for the future. We've got two or three really good players. I think it's a long, long time since Scotland have world-class players, but we've got competitive players and hopefully in the coming campaign, they can go on and do well. Thanks, and good luck for the rest of the season. Okay, thank you. Stuart, actually talking about the, you know, waiting to get fans back, I see the Cambridge Coal Games now being told it will be behind closed doors. They announced that about an hour ago. So it's, again, it's a setback in terms of hoping it, you know, by the beginning of October there might be some joy on that. And who says you don't have your finger on the pulse, Simon? There you go, you've just brought me the first bit of disappointing news today. That's a shame. Yeah, so that is a little setback of how things will look to be panning out for the future. You know, it's looking positive, but now. But it is what it is, unfortunately. I know, you know, every club I've sold season tickets, you know, and we'll have to have a look at how that goes about in the future, but I know a lot of people have been happy with it. Certainly the people I've known have been happy with the eye for low coverage. And that's been good. But yeah, hopefully it's only a little setback. And then the coming weeks, if we can get back on top of the, you know, the pandemic or the, you know, the rise in the COVID people that have got it, then, you know, we can start getting back people in. But yeah, that's a little bit disappointing that. And in terms of, obviously, we saw the other night about getting used to Valley Pride empty. I mean, you know, when the players are out there, do you think they can sort of switch off the bat like there's, you know, obviously there's not that noise and just sort of play the pitch perhaps well in the stadium? Yeah, I think, listen, I go back to my first time, first season here in my second spell when we were undefeated all season and, you know, the backing. It was, you know, 12-month. That's all well and good when things are going well, which is brilliant. You always want to play at home. But likewise, expectations, sometimes 14, 15,000. If things aren't going well, that's a test of your character sometimes. And I know, obviously, the disappointing seasons after where, you know, the club got relegated. I think it was hard for her speaking to people that were here at the time. It was difficult, you know, playing because they were disappointing the players, obviously weak and weak out with the performances. But so, again, it is what it is. Would we like, of course, would love 15, 16,000 people roaring a zombie because, you know, we've got a way that we want to play and I'm sure we support behind us. We've been really at it, which we are going to be anyway, but, yeah. We deal with it for now, but I think we're all in the same mindset that, you know, soon we can get fans back into the ground, especially at our place where they can make a massive difference and we'll look forward to that. And obviously, it seems to be a very different league this year. I mean, obviously, coaches sort of got Steve Bald, new manager. There's quite a few sort of newish managers in this league, aren't there? And there's quite a lot of teams that have had quite a big turnaround. So it's probably a difficult league to forecast, isn't it, because it looks very sort of, you know, always untested. Yeah, true. Yeah, young and up-and-coming managers, some teams have got anyway hungry and desperate to do well, naturally. That done me to say the old codges like myself are not hungry and desperate to do well. Can't be further from the truth on that one. But, yeah, and as you say, the squads were looking at the squads, you know, the changes to certain teams. But I think if you recently, you know, a couple of clubs have started bringing more plays, obviously Grimsby had to bring a lot in. They've done that a lot recently. There's a few of the clubs are bringing people in. And between now and the window closing, you know, there will be additions to squads. There's no doubt about that. And likewise with ours. But it's sometimes when you look at players, and I don't know certain people that have been brought in, then you can still go on your iPads and look at the previous clubs and how they're playing it, et cetera, et cetera. I mean, look at Bolton last week, you know, how many debutants, a full team of debutant, but obviously we know the people that played against us before, Ysasavitches and Yali Crawford, we know them. But as you say, it's hard to judge at the moment what sides are going to be up there. I mean, you know, I think for me, you like Ysolffords and certainly Bolton, them to come to mind as really strong, be strong favourites to be right up there with the recruitment they've done. But again, there's always surprises, but we'll just focus on ourselves. Happy way things are going at the moment. Lots of room for improvement, but you know, we're on the right lines. And in terms of going into the first game, I mean a natural excitement of it all started. Are you as sort of, you know, geed up for it as you would be if it was perhaps in, say, normal circumstances? Yeah, no, no, yeah, yes. I know it, I take your point, but we're all ready for it. We've been waiting, five, six months, whatever it is, and as I said to you, maybe six weeks ago, we were just desperate to get into pre-season, desperate to get on the training ground. Now we're desperate to get on the training ground. So now the excitement, the desire, the commitment from everyone at the club. And that's not just the playing staff and the players, it's everyone surrounded at the club. We're working ever so hard to get the games on, to be thorough in what we do, you know, behind the scenes. As I said, we've only got a tight-knit unit on the coaching staff and we've got a tight-knit unit back at the ground, but everyone gets full commitment to the club and everyone's working hard Brought to you by DIS, keeping companies connected with cloud-based solutions. Come on, City!