Simon Halsey hopes his decision to stay out of the Post-Friendly Lockdown Tournament will benefit Hollands & Blair next season.

The Blair boss chose not to get involved in the five-team tournament which ran between May and June and was won by Chatham.

Instead, Halsey told his squad to enjoy their free time before reporting back for pre-season.

“We took the decision not to play in the tournament,” said Halsey. “I personally thought coming out of lockdown and straight into football wasn’t the best thing for us.

“My view was that, after being stuck at home, the players should enjoy themselves.

“I said to them, go to the beach, go for a meal, go on holiday, whatever it is, and when you come back we’ll have a proper pre-season.

“We just didn’t need to be playing earlier, I couldn’t see the benefit of it.

“Whether that’s right or wrong, time will tell, but I wanted everyone to be able to spend proper time with their families.”

Blair lost 1-0 at Sittingbourne on Thursday and went down 2-0 at Beckenham on Saturday.

Halsey has been impressed with a number of young players and believes they will benefit from experienced heads.

“Results haven’t been what we wanted but we don’t worry about results in pre-season,” said Halsey.

“We got hammered by Tilbury at the start of pre-season but at one stage we had eight 18-year-olds and a 16-year-old playing, and that’s progression for the club.

“We picked up three injuries at Sittingbourne which puts me on eight first-team players injured but hopefully we’ll have a couple back for Sevenoaks away on Saturday.

“We’ll be fine. We’ve had Luke Harvey back training and ready to play, Ricky Freeman’s come back and Harry Goodger’s played the last couple of games.

“Harry was at Sittingbourne last season, he was going to call it a day, but he’s got that hunger back.

“He’s decided to come back and we’ll see how we go.

“I think the hunger is still there - as it is for Luke and Ricky.

“We’ve got a lot of young players and we want the experienced boys to educate these players on the pitch.

“If they wrap themselves around the older players, they can only learn and and they will properly be in contention for next season.

“I’m just hoping we get to finish the season. I’ve been here two years now and we haven’t finished one.”

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