Midfielder gives match reaction after first pre-season game
Exeter City midfielder Tom McCready was pleased to get back out on a pitch again for the first pre-season friendly of the year with a 1-1 draw at East Fife.Both goals came fairly late on – Christian Ribeiro prodded home to open for Exeter, but Nathan Austin got the equaliser with a few minutes remaining.
McCready, who played an hour as part of a midfield trio, nearly set Alex Fisher up for a goal with a dissecting through-ball, and also combined well with the striker before seeing a shot of his own diverted just past the post.
And for the former Morecambe man, who missed the end of last season with injury, it was pleasing to get the first of the exhibition fixtures out of the way.
“It’s good to get back to the games,” he explained. “You can train as much as you want, but the first time you play you’re always knackered!
“So it’s good to get it out of the way, and to blow the cobwebs off so to speak. It’s a good start.
“We want to build on the base that we’ve all got. Everyone comes back in decent shape these days, so it’s the next progression really. Avoiding injuries is important, so we have to manage our bodies properly and make sure that we stay in good physical shape.
“You want to win, like any sportsman, but the result doesn’t actually matter. Today Tis didn’t give us too much information before the game – it was just a case of going out to get into a game-like situation.
“We’ll start to concentrate on results, patterns of play and shapes of play the more we go.”
The second fixture follows two days later, with a visit to East Fife’s divisional rivals Arbroath.
And Tom is expecting the set-up to serve a similar purpose and allow more of the team to get some game-time into their legs.
“I don’t think we’re going to get bombarded with too much information again,” said Tom of the trip to Gayfield Park.
“It may be a case of the lads who didn’t play too much tonight will play a little bit more on Thursday in order to share the game-time and keep everyone at the same level.”
Watch the full interview with Tom on Grecian PlayerHD below.