Football Season Guide

Woking are looking for a better season ahead after a rather dispiriting and underwhelming previous season. Garry Hill is a fine coach at this level but he was not supported by the board in terms of money to sign players and the loss of Dan Holman to eventual league champions Cheltenham in January proved the end of any hopes of a play-off charge. Now the Cards need to rebuild and get ready for what will be another challenging campaign on one of the smaller budgets in the league. They lost by far their best player from last season in John Goddard, the free scoring wide midfielder getting a deserved move to Swindon after a stellar couple of seasons in Surrey. Hill has a massive hole to fill after his departure and it will be interesting whether Max Kretzschmar, joining from Wycombe, can replicate his impact given that they are quite close in style. The move that left the Woking fans angered over the summer was that of Scott Rendell, the striker who was their lead scorer and main prize asset before injuring his knee at the start of last season. He missed the entire campaign and upon his recovery has signed for local rivals Aldershot. It is indeed a controversial move but Hill will be keen to get with matters on the pitch and will want the new players to get on the act quickly and bolster a squad that clearly underperformed last season. Mark Ricketts, the dependable goalie Jake Cole and Chris Arthur are all important departures during the summer and it will be interesting whether Delano Sam-Yorke, back at his hometown club after a number of stints with other sides in the division, Ben Gordon and Gozie Ugwu are able to turn their potential and be useful performers. Ismail Yakubu will be meanwhile like a new signing for Hill as the rugged defender has recovered from the serious injury suffered at the start of last season and will provide experience and muscle at the back.