Squires Gate kicked off their pre season campaign with a 3-1 win over West Lancs side Fulwood Amateurs.

Gate took a squad of 21 over to Fulwood including 8 new faces all looking to impress Dave McCann. McCann started with just one new face for the first half with the rest of the squad all featuring last season. Both teams started the game at a high tempo with both sides seeing plenty of the ball. It was midfielder Josh Kay who stood out for Gate. His runs down the left hand side often troubled Fulwood’s defence. Gate looked fairly comfortable in the opening 30 minutes although you could tell it was their first competitive outing of the season.

Gate opened the scoring on 40 minutes. The ball was played out to Billy Mckenna on the right hand side whose cross into the box found Captain Danny Penswick in the box to tap the ball in.

Gate made 5 changes at half time with all the back four and keeper being swapped.

As the second half wore on substitutions slowed the game down and took the sting out of the game. Soon after the second half Cummings had the chance to shoot on the edge of the box but pulled the ball back to Alex Mckendrick who dragged his shot wide. Mckendrick had another chance soon after but his shot went well wide of the far post.

The home side would make the scoreline level on 75 minutes from a set piece. The freekick was fired into the near post, the keeper had the shot covered but stumbled and dropped the ball. Unfortunately for Gate it was a Fulwood attacker who was quickest to the ball to poke in.

Gate would go ahead again just 5 minutes after when Clarke at his second attempt fired past the keeper easily. It would be Clarke again who would add his second and Gates third of the day. A long ball over the top from Keeper Powell found the run of Cummings, whose clever touch and pass fooled the on rushing keeper. And with acres of space, Clarke had the simple task of tapping into the empty net.

After the game Gate manager Dave McCann said: I’m fairly satisfied with what I saw, were a long way off the end product but that’s going to be the case considering it was our first friendly. The club has got another 2 midweek fixtures so we’ll be having another look at some of the players that were unknown to us today.