Worksop boss Craig Parry impressed with his side’s attacking intent

James Baxendale drills the ball past the goalkeeper. Pic by Lewis Pickersgill.

The first team began the game brightly, racing into a two-goal lead with strikes from Mikey Dunn and James Baxendale.

However, towards the half-hour mark, the Tigers became lackadaisical and allowed the Under-21s to get a foothold back into the game through Joel Cousins before Aidan Nagi netted a two-minute brace to put the youngsters ahead.

Despite the setback, the first team eventually found their stride after the wake-up call, netting seven to comfortably win their first pre-season fixture.

“Apart from a crazy 10 minutes, where I thought the Under-21s looked very good and they passed us off the pitch in that period, I thought we showed a great attacking intent,” said Parry.

“We need to take our chances, especially in the early stages where we had a centre-half who could have had a hat-trick from set-plays and various attackers who could have had four or five.

“That being said, let’s not make this a one-way thing because defensively on the three goals we weren’t good enough.

“These pre-season games are good because they identify where we are not 100% gelling and we can prepare to work on that on Thursday at training.

“I think the disappointing thing was that I don’t think it is the lack of game time; I believe the goals were sloppy and there were errors that we could have avoided, not just individually, but as a system.

“I think it was more tactical than the lads not playing for a while.”

Worksop next face Parkgate on Saturday afternoon at Sandy Lane in Parry’s second friendly in charge of the Tigers.

Parry believes that the game against the Steelmen at the weekend will prove to be a different test for his side.

Parry added: “We played lads who were young and fit and are trained to move the ball quickly on pitches like this and look to pass teams off the pitch.

“Saturday’s test will be slightly different. We have got to be a little bit more physical and we need to up the level that we want to be playing at week in week out.

“It will be a different challenge for us, but it is about how well we cope with that challenge and how we cope with the physicality and then we need to stamp our authority on Parkgate on Saturday.”