Glyn Hodges said that the trips to Germany and Spain have put Wimbledon’s squad in good shape for the start of 2019/20.
The Dons continue pre-season preparations with a match at Met Police tonight (7.45 pm kick-off) and our Assistant Manager reported no serious injuries with just 11 days to go until the start of a new League One season.
“Everyone is fit,” said Glyn. “There are one or two little knocks, but nothing major. Any player who does miss tonight will be okay for Saturday. At the moment, we are four and a half weeks into pre-season and we’ve not lost anyone through injury. It’s important that everyone completes the bulk of pre-season. I think the defensive players are probably in the best shape because four or five of them have had 90 minutes. We’ve got others that need 90 minutes, but they are flying at the moment.
“The Germany and La Manga trips were like Premier League tours: the facilities, the way we were looked after, the conditions of the pitches. The trips away were different class and the opposition has been good as well. At the right times, the teams we’ve faced have helped us to gain extra fitness. The German sides we faced were probably two or three weeks in front of us in terms of pre-season fitness and those matches were good tests for us. Obviously playing against AFC Bournemouth was too good an opportunity to turn down. That was a great experience and in the Plymouth game we were really pleased for long spells with what we produced.”
Glyn added that results in pre-season are secondary as the squad gears up for the main challenge of taking on Rotherham United on Saturday 3 August.
“We have been mixing the teams up,” said Glyn. “We’ve had a couple of trialists involved and young kids playing too. We’ve still not really put our strongest 11 out yet and no one gets three points in pre-season. We would like to win a few, but in the grand scheme of things it’s about getting ready for 3 August and we are looking forward to that.
“We will aim tonight to give some of the players 90 minutes, but we have a big squad and there are three games left before the season starts. Everyone will get 90 minutes before the first game so that they are all available for selection.”