htafc.com caught up with Town boss Andy Ritchie ahead of this evening's trip to the Welfare Ground to face Northern Counties East side AFC Emley (7.30pm kick-off).

Tonight's game is the first pre-season friendly ahead of the new season, but Town made the trip down to Stoke City yesterday to face Tony Pulis' squad in a series of short behind-closed-doors matches and Ritchie told htafc.com that he was happy with how the day went.

"It wasn't a normal friendly as such - it was more about getting minutes on the pitch", explained the Town manager. "We managed to get about 70 minutes yesterday, which is a step-up from the internal practice match we had on Saturday."

One of the highlights from yesterday's series of matches was a Danny Racchi free-kick that nestled in the top corner of the Stoke goal.

"It was a good workout for the lads and it was good to get a bit of contact play. Tony (Pulis) was very accommodating and Stoke looked after us; in terms of an exercise designed to get us more 'football' fitness, it was very useful.

"I've known Tony for quite a while and he was very good to me when I left Barnsley, letting me come in for a couple of days to watch training. We had a chat during the closed season and arranged this get-together to have a few little games and it's always good to have friendlies against teams with managers that you know, just to make sure that you don't get a clogging!"

This insight gives a clue into some of the other Town friendlies, as Ritchie has known Mansfield manager Billy Dearden for a long time and Town Coach Martyn Booty played with Hucknall Town boss Andy Legg at Reading.

Thankfully, there was only one minor injury to any of the Town squad after yesterday.

"Brando (Chris Brandon) got a bit of a knock down his shin but other than that everyone was ok. We'll just monitor his problem today, but we'll be taking a full strength squad to AFC Emley. We left out Tom Clarke, Malvin Kamara and Danny Cadamarteri yesterday as they were feeling a little bit tight but they will all be involved this evening.

"We'll be using everybody tonight, as it's our second match-based day in a row and we want to minimise injuries ahead of this weekend's trip to Bridlington. I also want to have a fairly hard training session on Friday too."

Tonight's game is pay at the turnstile - £6 Adults, £3 Senior Citizens and £1 Juniors.

For directions to the Welfare Ground, click HERE.

For a report on the games at Stoke City from their local newspaper, click HERE.

Town's Squad vs. AFC Emley

Andy Holdsworth, David Mirfin, Nathan Clarke, Chris Brandon, Jonathan Worthington (c), Danny Schofield, Frank Sinclair, Tom Clarke, Luke Beckett, Michael Collins, Danny Racchi, Aaron Hardy, Matthew Young, Andy Booth, Danny Cadamarteri, James Berrett, Simon Eastwood, Matthew Glennon, Joe Skarz, Lucas Akins, Malvin Kamara, Mitchell Bailey, Luke Malcher