Ben Davies was delighted after today's opening day rout of Macclesfield Town at the Prostar. An own goal from John Brain and second-half goals from Grant Holt, Graham Coughlan and Dave Hibbert made it a perfect start for Paul Simpson's men.
"Last year we got off to the same sort of start but faded away. It's only one win, there's still another 45 to go, but you can only beat what's put in front of you and so from that point of view it's been a good day.
"It's been a good pre-season too. The lads are all fit and were raring to go today. We're really happy with the way we've been passing the ball and are delighted with a 4-0 win, but it's behind us now and all the focus is now on Tuesday.
"The way we passed and moved today was the most pleasing thing. Everybody looked good on the ball, the passing was superb and four goals and a clean sheet just puts icing on top of the cake really."
The skipper also paid tribute to the contributions made by the seven new players who joined the club in the summer.
"Everyone will be really happy with the way they played today. Grant's off and running, Graham scored with a header and Shane made a telling contribution to the opening goal. People say it takes time for new players to settle but on today's evidence they're gelling already. We should have scored more in the first half really. We were a bit unlucky but we knew if we kept banging away at them we'd get our rewards and that's what happened. As soon as we scored we looked comfortable."
Davies was felled in the area four minutes into the second-half after intercepting a poor clearance, allowing Grant Holt the chance to open his account via the penalty spot, and I asked if there was much contact before he went down.
"Yeah, the lad left his leg in and if I'd have got round him I'd have been one-on-one with the keeper and I would have scored myself. The gaffer's always banging on about being alive to situations and taking quick free-kicks, so when they cleared the initial free-kick from Kev (McIntyre) I was glad we got something out of it."
Ben has certainly come back a lot fitter and has probably benefitted more than most from the summer break, following last season's injury woes.
"I'm fit now and hope I can stay injury free. I've changed the way I train - I don't train as much, or for as long. It's all short and sharp and lots of speed work. I've also changed my diet so I felt good out there and hopefully it will continue. I was disappointed not to score but I hope I get that sort of disappointment every week if we win 4-0 and play like that," he said.
"If you look at the teams that have gone up recently, they've all been solid and don't concede a lot of goals, and if you want to go up - and of course we do - you have to have a strong backbone right through the middle of the side and I think we've got that now. We've also got good strength in depth so hopefully we can push on to reach our target.
"Even when you look at the lads who weren't involved today, the likes of Mossy and Ashy and Symesy, over the course of a season you're going to need the 25 or so players in your squad - it's a long old season.
"We've put a lot of work into our pre-season and you need to do that to come back as fit as you possibly can. You can tell from today's performance that we reaped the reward of all that running and hard work."
Davies also acknowledged the crowd today with around 5 and a half thousand home fans at the Prostar.
"It was great support form our fans today. They hardly brought any fans and I think if we can keep winning and playing like that, we could be pushing towards sell-outs providing we can maintain that level of performance."
A really good day at the office then for Salop, but there's an awful long way to go. Anyone who's already getting carried away, need only remind themselves of last season's opener to bring themselves crashing back down to earth!
