Having proved a hugely popular figure with the Yellow Army, Tom Lapslie already has his targets in mind for 2022/23.
After arriving at Plainmoor last summer having previously been with Colchester United for six years, United’s combative midfielder enjoyed a fine first season under Gary Johnson’s management, and took time to reflect on the campaign just gone.
“I was enjoying my football again which was the main thing for me personally, and working with the Gaffer and Downsey helped that along with all the other lads, so was nice to be playing football again,” said Tom.
“The way we finished the season was good after hitting a good spell of form just after Christmas, where we were one of the top form teams. It was just unfortunate that we left ourselves a bit too much to do with the poor start we made, which is hopefully something we can rectify this coming season and try and be up there from the start and not give ourselves a mountain to climb.”
With pre-season beginning this week and not very long now until our first warm-up game at Buckland on the 8th July, Lapslie let us into his thoughts on pre-season and what it entails.
“I think when I was younger I didn’t mind it so much, but now I’ve had a fair few and I think this is my tenth or eleventh pre-season I’ve done – enough to know that I don’t enjoy them! It’s one of those things that you just have to do. I’ve missed a whole pre-season before with injury which is the worst, as you are playing catch up for the whole season because you pick up little injuries throughout the season, as you haven’t got the base fitness from doing pre-season.
“The most important thing is to actually do it and just get it in and push yourself through. I find the first week is the toughest, but once the games start coming around it gets easier, even though the sessions are still tough you start getting back into the swing of things and get going. The worst thing for me is when you walk up onto the training pitches and you see just four poles in the furthest corners of the pitch. You think, here we go, and they look five miles apart! Once the session is done though, you feel better for it because a lot of it is the anticipation and build up to the sessions, and the running you are going to have to do, but as I said once the games start coming around it’s soon forgotten.”
With the new seasons fixtures due for release on Wednesday 6th July and the season beginning on Saturday 6th August, the midfielder was in a confident mood as the season approaches, as well as having a message for the Yellow Army.
“My person pre-season programme has been going ok, though I’m a little behind after the injury I picked up against Chesterfield, so I’ve been keeping as fit as I can on the bike, on the rower, and swimming until I was allowed to start running again. I’m hoping that’s given me a bit of a base to work from, I’ve been back running now for a few weeks, so hopefully with me being quite fit anyway, I won’t be too far behind when we come back on Thursday, and I will be there or thereabouts fitness-wise and raring to go.
“Promotion is the thing that we all want but there will obviously be quite a few teams saying the same, so we have got to make sure we are fitter then everybody else and ultimately pick up more points then anybody else, and get promoted, so its just a case of getting a better start and finding consistency a bit earlier on and we will be right in the mix. Personally I’d like to score a few more goals, and having scored back-to-back goals for the first time in my career last season I’d like to do that again this year, as well as contribute more in the attacking sense while still doing a bit of the dirty work as well! Hopefully I can influence games while getting the other boys fired up, at the same time and put in good performances and get three points as often as we can.
“I’d like to thank the Yellow Army for last season. I still remember the first game against Altrincham when the Gaffer pulled us over to the pop side for a little team talk, and I remember how loud it was and I thought wow this is loud. The atmosphere was electric although we didn’t deliver that day, which is what we will be trying to rectify this season.
“We are thanking them for their support all of last season and hoping they follow us again this season, and hopefully we can be challenging from the off rather then trying to sneak in at the end, and give them something to cheer about all campaign.”