THE friendly that should have brought Bradford Park Avenue and Albion Sports out of their summer recess on Saturday had to be shelved because Farsley Celtic's pitch was not ready.

Albion groundshare with the Celts, so keep their home warm-up games to a minimum, but they were delighted that Mark Bower agreed to bring his Avenue squad for what would have been the Vanarama National League North outfit's first outing since their 3-1 defeat at runners-up Kidderminster Harriers on the final day of last term.

However, the remedial work done on the playing surface at the Nest has taken longer than expected.

Albion manager Kulvinder Sandhu said: "Unfortunately Saturday's game was off because the pitch was not ready due to the work Farsley have done on it over the summer – but the good news is that we've managed to rearrange it.

"It's been put back two weeks (to Saturday July 15), so its still on a weekend, which is important for us as that will bring more people in.

"We're very grateful to Mark (Bower) and Park Avenue for honouring their promise of a pre-season game."

Albion were at liberty to accommodate the rescheduling as they had a free Saturday due to another club requesting a change of date.

Sandhu said: "I would have liked to play Park Avenue this weekend, because my players need a game after a couple of training sessions, but it worked out well for our club as we had no game on the new date and Farsley didn't have a home fixture planned.

"Originally we had Yorkshire Amateur pencilled in that day but they rang us and asked for a different date. We agreed to that not knowing that the Park Avenue game would be put back.

"It's all worked out okay and we've got five, maybe six, friendly games, so that's about right for our preparation. But I'm trying to get one in before the Avenue game because I'd prefer to start on the match fitness work this week."