The season is almost back upon us and the World Cup seems like a distant memory now.

It was very refreshing to see England do so well as I am a big England fan. My club is West Ham but where they don’t have much success we Hammers tend to gravitate towards England for glory. It’s been underwhelming for years and whether that is down to our approach to tournaments or the quality of the team it was nice to see a team look like a team and have a go. We weren’t amazing and the draw was favourable but we still did well.

From the non-league side of things, it ended up getting in the way. It wreaked havoc with the early part of pre-season as England games were clashing with friendlies and training. But you have to respect it’s the semi-final so you can’t deny players the chance to watch it with their friends.

We still have work being done on our pitch so we play away quite a bit at the start of the season. We have FA Cup and League Cup games at Aveley and the only game we really miss out on is against Canvey Island. They didn’t want to swap the home and away games so we play at Aveley again but we will get some practice in on it. I’m a glass half full kind of man!

In terms of the league this season, it is difficult to look beyond Heybridge Swifts and Canvey, while it would be unwise to rule out Aveley and AFC Sudbury. They have successful managers and were spending a lot of last season gearing towards this year.

Coggeshall, who we face on the opening day, are the darkhorses for me. They have a strike force that can match any in the division.

And in terms of players to watch out for, I would say Matt Price and Mitchell Gilbey.

Price, at Heybridge, has scored goals throughout pre-season and looks dangerous and Gilbey, of Canvey, is another quality player. His play-off semi-final performance was superb. There are a lot of talented boys and I am excited to get going.