BRIDPORT assistant manager Ryan Dovell says today’s pre-season friendly at Hythe and Dibden (7.45pm) is going to be good practice for their system.

Bridport have brought in numerous faces over the summer, coupled with a change in management, and Dovell highlighted the need to click as a unit.

When asked about his expectations, Dovell told Echosport: “We are obviously still trying to gel as a unit, with a lot of new players coming in, so any game time is going to be good practice for us all just to get used to the system and everything that we are trying to do.

“Obviously results are not that important at this stage, it is all just about getting our fitness levels up and like I said getting used to the system.”

Dovell also confirmed that Saturday’s pre-season friendly at Bashley had to be cancelled due to Bridport being unable to raise a side.

He said: “Unfortunately that was the case. You arrange these fixtures as soon as you possibly can and then we found out that a few of ours were away on a stag do, another couple were on holiday, some are injured and another couple messaged us on the day saying they were unavailable, one with injury, one with illness.

"So it got to the stage where we only had the bare numbers so we did not think it was going to be beneficial for any of us to travel to Bashley. Obviously with a few trialists as well we did not think it was going to be a beneficial exercise for us.”