Hartley Wintney V Knaphill - pre-season friendly - Saturday, July 22

Hartley Wintney have made a start with their pre-season friendly schedule ahead of season 2023-24.

Following relegation at the end of last season virtually all of last season's recognised first team squad have departed for pastures new.

Manager Rowan Vine has now made a start in rebuilding almost an entire new team from scratch and in the third of the friendly matches a 3-0 win was recorded against Knaphill from the Combined Counties League.

READ MORE: Hartley Wintney names female coach after Dingley joins Forest Green

No fewer than 20 players were given the opportunity to impress and it was three trialists who scored the goals.

On 11 minutes a right wing corner was headed home by a trialist centre back.

Hartley added to the lead when a decent move saw a trialist midfielder fire home from the edge of the penalty area on 22 minutes.

The Knappers had a good second half and were unfortunate not to get on the scoresheet. However, the last word went to Row when after 79 minutes the trialist full back sent in a right wing cross cum shot which sailed into the net. 

SEE ALSO: Basingstoke's Brody Peart signs for Premier League Brighton

All in all a good work out for both sides. In the two previous friendly matches Hartley won 2-1 against Volta Sports and lost by the same score against Baffin Milton Rovers.

In both these matches like the Knaphill match a considerable number of players were used.

After the match, Vine said: "It was a good exercise today and pleased to have run the rule over 20 players. I felt we moved the ball well and in particular the first half.

"With each of the games there has been a good number of positives to take out. However it is early days and obviously we will be looking to progressively improve the performances as we get a more settled team."