Il Ciocco Adventures Part II

As promised the manager contacted us last night to let us know how we got on in the second training match in Italy. We took on a club called (but don't quote me on this) Sporting Club 2001 and beat them 1-0. Apparently they are a semi-professional team who won their league last year but as yet we've not had time to dig up any info on them...they are based half an hour away from Il Ciocco.

Jim said: "This was a much better test than the game the other day, because the other team sat in and tried to not let us play. They were well organised and difficult to break down but the only had one shot on goal in the full 90 minutes and that was a long range effort from a free kick. Alan Combe did not have a save to make"

He continued: "We passed the ball about well and Freddy was unlucky not to score when one of his shots hit off the cross bar. It was Hooky who eventually got the goal and it was a cracking effort. We deserved the win but the results in these games don't go for much, I'm just pleased that the players got a better work out this time and that should stand us in better stead in the long run."

Jim mentioned in his last report that a French defender was flying in for the Thursday match so we asked how he got on, Jim said: "As it turned out the flight times did not fit in with our plans and the player would have arrived too late to take part in the game so we called him and asked him not to travel. Hopefully we can get him over to Rugby Park when we come home and have a look at him then. We will be playing a closed door game when we come back and we hope to field two or three trialists in that match, if all goes to plan he should be one of them."

On more of a sour note it look like the old training injury jinx is back. We mention the nickname 'sicknote' in the last report in jest and what happens? You guessed it, Dargs did not take part in the game on Thursday because he was out with a groin strain...fortunately its not a long term thing and he should be back soon enough. David Lilley also took a knock in training and missed out with a calf injury but there was worse news to come...

Jim said: "We had looked at Dean Gordon because we thought we needed cover at left back and as I said before we prefer Hooky playing further up the park, but he's training with Hibs at the moment so we probably won't take that any further. We were confident that Sean Dillon was ready to come back in after a season troubled with injury and suspension but unfortunately he broke down in training and could be out for five or six weeks and that has upset our plans."

It looks like Hooky will have to fill in at the back again unless we sign another left back but, and this is just our opinion, JJ seems ready to bring Dillon back in and we doubt whether he will buy in a left back just for the sake of a few weeks. Our next update will be after Saturday's game...Ciao!