We must start again – Foyle

York City manager Martin Foyle has said that his players must quickly forget last season and simply knuckle down to the task at hand.

The Minstermen almost achieved that objective last term when coming within ninety minutes of a long-awaited return to the Football League. But a disastrous opening half-hour against Oxford United in their play-off final at Wembley soon put paid to those hopes as York failed to do themselves justice and slid to a very disappointing 3-1 defeat.

“Last season has gone,” Foyle told the Yorkshire Post. “There was some fantastic football played, some great results, the FA Cup run, play-offs and getting to Wembley but now we need to knuckle down and start again.”

Despite the likes of Oxford and Stevenage leaving the division, Foyle was anticipating another very difficult challenge this season as York again find themselves cast amongst a whole host of former league clubs.

“I think it’s going to be a lot harder as there are some big spending teams in and around us,” he continued. “I’m just telling people out there how I think this year will go with clubs like Fleetwood, Grimsby, Darlington, Wrexham and Cambridge, while Mansfield have spent heavily too. It’s going to be a very strong league and one in which a lot of teams will beat each other.”

Foyle has seemingly recruited well over the summer with several new signings coming to Bootham Crescent. Defenders Duane Courtney (Kidderminster Harriers) and Greg Young (Altrincham) and goalkeeper David Knight (Histon) have compensated for the loss of Ben Purkiss (Oxford), Luke Graham (Mansfield) and Josh Mimms (released), while Jonathan Smith (Forest Green) should offer fresh drive and impetus into midfield.

Much of his focus has been in adding a couple of decent and reliable wide players, and Peter Till (Walsall) and David McDermott (Kidderminster) will be given the responsibility of increased service from the flanks to an attack boosted by the arrival of hungry young striker George Purcell (Braintree Town).

Confidence would already appear to be very high around the York faithful with in excess of 1,000 season tickets already reported as sold, which is an increase of more than 300 from last term. However, Foyle was remaining typically calm and measured in the face of increased expectancy this time around.

“It’ll be a tough season – I think it’s harder than League Two to get out of, up to 13 clubs could win promotion and 17 have got a chance of getting into the play-offs – but after 10 games we’ll look again and if we need to add to it at the right times then we will.”