Town Boss Dave Flitcroft says his side are raring to go for tomorrow’s 2017/18 Sky Bet League Two opener.
The Reds get the new season underway with a long trip to Carlisle United (3pm Kick-Off), and the gaffer wants his side to be competitive against their fellow promotion hopefuls.
“We are ready to go, there’s no doubt about that,” he told members of the local press.
“I’ve been looking forward to Saturday since the fixtures came out.
“I’m expecting a real professional team and Keith Curle’s sides are very professional. He’s been building a promotion squad for three years and one thing he has put in place is a very professional environment.
“It is up to us to go up there and be very professional ourselves and be very competitive - that’s what I’m expecting from the team.
“Carlisle will be highly competitive and highly professional and that’s what we’ll be coming up against on Saturday.”
Tomorrow will see Flitcroft reunited with one of his Bury promotion winners in Kelvin Etuhu, who joined Carlisle on a free transfer earlier this summer.
“When we got promoted from League Two with Bury, Kelv and Tom Soares were a massive part of the midfield when I went to a 3-5-3 and a 4-5-1,” he added.
“We are ready to go, there’s no doubt about that. I’ve been looking forward to Saturday since the fixtures came out."
“Kelv was a big part of that midfield, he breaks play up and he’s a destroyer. He likes the ugly side of football where you’ve got to break teams down and he’s also great at retaining the ball.
“I’ve got a lot of time for Kelv and we’ve had a lot of good memories together. He was a big part of the Barnsley team that stayed up and I brought him to Bury to help get us up at the first time of asking, and he did.”
Flitcroft also provided an update on the club’s recruitment drive with plenty of hard work going on behind the scenes.
“We’ve been grafting behind the scenes as a football club,” he continued.
“I keep chipping away at managers, I am very persistent and managers know that.
“We’re chipping away at it but without real success, certainly for Saturday’s game, which I’m disappointed with a little bit.”
