Good afternoon and welcome to the officials, players and supporters of Caerleon Football Club to the Marston’s Stadium for this afternoon’s MacWhirter Welsh League Division One match.

I’d also like to welcome our referee Jonathan Twigg from Haverfordwest and his assistants Haydn Griffiths from Swansea and Byron Evans from Maesteg. yes"  Our opponents have made a steady start to the season and it's a game where we need three points to kick start our league season again.

Our last home league match we drew 3-3 against Bettws in a game where we had enough chances to have won the match comfortably but we had to rely on two late goals to salvage a point. yes"  Point blank misses and a penalty miss in the first half led to us being 2 goals down but we showed good character in clawing the two goal deficit back. On saying that, we should be winning our home games and I will be looking for a marked improvement today.

We welcome back Mark and Ian Jones and Carl Evans but injuries have ruled out Carl Payne and Mica Chunuonsee.  Our last match saw us going out of the Welsh Cup on penalties against Welsh Premier league outfit Aberystwyth. Our performance was exceptional over 120 minutes where we were the better side throughout the whole match. yes"  Lady luck didn't shine on us as we hit the woodwork on 2 occasions and played some great football on the day. yes"  Aberystwyth's manager Brian Coyne was very complimentary after the game in saying that he felt we deserved to have won the game and that our ball retention and fitness levels were very good. yes"  The 14 players all played their part in a very entertaining match played on a good surface which was conducive to play attractive football. yes"  We must take that performance on board from now until the rest of the season and start climbing the table as quickly as possible.

We must also remember that this current squad is very young and it will take time for players and the team collectively to reach it's potential.  A little bit of patience and encouragement is required right now because if this team can stick together then again potentially this team can be as good as any Lido side over the previous decade.

 Enjoy the game

Craig

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