Silsden's players will spend their last free weekend getting into shape before they report back for pre-season training on Monday.

Manager Chris Reape said: “We will be back to it after the weekend, which is unbelievable really. It only seems a short time ago that we were playing our final league game of last season.”

Silsden completed their season in the first week of May with a 1-0 home win over Maine Road in the North West Counties League Premier Division.

That took them to 57 points and a 12th-placed finish, which pleased Reape.

“It was a record points total for the club at this level but it would be nice to do better and break into the top ten this time around,” added the boss.

“But first we have to get through the pre-season and do some hard yards. We had to get things going early because our first friendly, at Oxenhope, is very soon.

"It will be the first game on their new ground. It was supposed to be the official opening of it but that has already been done by Tom Cleverley.”

The Manchester United star, a former Eccleshill United and Bradford City youth player, was due to be in attendance for Silsden’s visit but he was called into Stuart Pearce’s Great Britain squad for the Olympic Games.

“We have got five games in total, with Pontefract Collieries, Brighouse Town, Clitheroe and Liversedge, and we are happy with that. We had hoped to get Bradford City again but that doesn’t look likely now.

“I think a lot of clubs at our level are coming back early because of the August 4 start to the new season and the FA Cup extra-preliminary round.

"We have a Saturday game, a night game and then an FA Cup tie, so we need to be ready for a big eight days to kick off the season.”