Medway coach Taff Gwilliam is looking forward to a far more challenging season.

His team blitzed their way to the London 2 South East title last season, clinching the championship crown with 101 points from 22 games.

They are now back in London 1 South where two seasons ago they finished third, starting the campaign at Gravesend on Saturday.

Gwilliam said: “We did well last time in that league but we’re not quite as strong this time around. We had a few foreign-based players before but we do hope to be competitive.

“We’ve got a tough opener against Gravesend and I know they will be organised.

“We’ve got Old Colfeians (who finished second to Medway last season) after that so that’s a couple of early local games which will test us.

“I am looking forward to how we compete in a much tougher league. The lads weren’t tested much last season.

“We’ve got more competition in our squad and that’s something we didn’t have a lot of last year, as we had a small squad. The boys coming in are going to add that competition.”

Gwilliam has brought in last season’s Kent under-20 captain Josh Hawkins to the team. Tom Whitnell has also returned, after three years at university in Wales, adding strength to the front row.

He said: “We’ve added a couple of lads to the squad which we needed to do because it was too small for the level that we are going to be playing and how tough the league is.

“We will see where we are after the first few games and hopefully we’ll get something out of those games.”