Herne Bay player-manager Liam Friend takes positives from their 2-0 pre-season friendly home loss to lower-division Phoenix Sports

Liam Friend found positives from his first defeat as Herne Bay’s player-boss at the weekend.

Bay suffered a 2-0 loss to lower-division Phoenix Sports. While Friend felt more frustrated immediately after the defeat, he has since reflected on the bigger picture.

“If you had spoken to me straight after the game, I would have been a bit more negative,” said Friend.

“But when you work through it with the management team, it’s a good thing in a way. If you go through pre-season without any problems, that can cause bigger problems.

“We did play well on Saturday. We were very good on the ball and it was just in both boxes where we weren’t good enough.

"We didn’t defend well and didn’t create as many chances as we should have.

“I know a couple of players have had bad blisters and maybe they’ve not had a lot of training, and it showed, although four players did come through 90 minutes.

“We had four injuries but they didn’t look like too much to worry about.

“It was definitely preparation for the season, though, where things happened and we had to react!

“In the first half, we weren’t very good and, in the second half, we did improve - but not enough to improve the result.

"The results don’t matter as much in pre-season.

“But it was nice to see we can get a reaction and, hopefully, that stands us in good stead.”

Ironically, Herne Bay had been beaten by Phoenix Sports 2-1 at Winch’s Field in an Isthmian South East fixture in late February in what was then-manager James Collins’ first game in charge.

“It was a pretty similar side that day to the one we played on Saturday,” said Friend. “We have got a lot of new players whereas they looked more settled.

“They looked like their season starts earlier than ours does, as well, which it