Knight - Studley will be stronger (From Redditch Advertiser)

Knight - Studley will be stronger

7:00pm Wednesday 12th September 2012 in Sport

STUDLEY boss Lee Knight believes his side will be stronger for a tough set of fixtures at the start of the Midland Alliance campaign.

The Bees have already came up against the likes of high flyers Stratford and Stourport Swifts this season.

They battled through another clash against one of the league’s best teams as they produced an impressive display in Saturday’s 1-1 draw with Rocester, which saw Nathan Edgington on target.

With a trip to mid-table Westfields on Saturday, Knight wants his side to build on their encouraging performance.

The manager is also feeling upbeat as the likes of Trevor Edwards, Craig Hall and Liam O’Shea have returned from injuries and holidays to bolster his squad.

Knight also drafted in Chasetown midfielder Mark Hands on loan.

He said: “We’ve played a lot of the teams with the biggest budgets in the league so it has been tough.

“But I have been pleased with the performance of the players and now we’re getting a few back hopefully we’ll be able to go from there.

“I thought the performance against Rocester was excellent.”

Meanwhile, Alvechurch will be hoping progress in the FA Vase on Saturday when they take on Midland Combination Premier outfit Walsall Wood at Lye Meadow on Saturday (3pm kick-off).

They go into the match on the back of a thrilling 4-3 win over Ellesmere in the Alliance on Saturday.

The Churchmen were 3-0 up but were pegged back before a late goal made sure of the win.

Elliott Nash, Liam Spink and Ryan Edmunds fired the Churchmen into a commanding lead but it needed a second goal by Nash to seal all three points.

However, Alvechurch suffered a setback when top-scorer Andy Nicol dropped down two levels, due to work commitments, to rejoin Fairfield Villa in the Midland Combination Division One.