Sheppey Rugby Club’s new season gets under way this weekend.

It’s a much-changed Kent 4 Division that they’ll be playing in, as tough fixtures await from the likes of Beckenham 2nds and Dartfordians 2nds, but coach Pete Jones is embracing the challenge.

Sheppey, who start at home to Old Gravesendians today (Saturday), have just completed a pre-season with three games against higher-league opposition.

Jones said: “We deliberately targeted opposition who were in higher leagues, playing Faversham where we lost but played all right, a team in Essex who are the equivalent of two divisions up and Maidstone on [last] Friday night who are two divisions above us, losing by just a couple of tries.

“I am never bothered about scores in pre-season, win or lose, it’s all about getting people on the pitch. We were quite pleased, those who look at results probably aren’t, but what we got from it as coaches we were really pleased with.

“We’re looking forward to the new season with a couple of new teams in the league which always make it interesting. It was a bit of a surprise to see Beckenham 2nds and Dartfordians 2nds in there, but fair enough.”

Foots Cray and King’s College Hospital have come down while Tonbridge Juddians 3rds and Sittingbourne were promoted.

“It’s exciting to play different teams,” said Jones.

“There are still some teams we played last year, but it is a different challenge and we always said we wanted to play against better teams. It gives you a good idea of where you are.”

Jones will assess Sheppey’s standing at Christmas to see where they sit. Unlike the league’s mid-season split the RFU did last year, the same 12 teams will compete home and away for the full season this time around.

“We’ll have a look at Christmas and that will decide where we’re at,” said Jones.

“If we are mid-table at Christmas and teams above us are all the teams that I expect to be above us, then we would be in a good place.

“Promotions are brilliant, they are fantastic, that is what everyone should aim for and I am not saying we’re not going to aim for promotion, you do naturally as a competitive person, but it is more about how we keep growing our player base.”

There haven’t been too many changes in the squad over the summer.

Last year’s pre-season was about changing the way the team played, which Jones admitted was a long process.

“This year was about trying to fine-tune,” he said. “And also about giving us some other attacking options that we didn’t have and it has given us time to do that and tighten up.

“What made pre-season different is that we don’t do the normal things that everyone else does, lifting tyres, pushing weights. I have done that as a player and I hated it.

“We just played, did all the technical stuff, all the bits of rugby we can do with a ball and run, and you don’t realise you’ve been asked to run 150 metres and you’ll be smiling, which reflected in the good numbers we had at training.

“The players choose to be there training on a Wednesday night so they don’t need me asking them to be picking up car tyres!”

Sheppey will run two teams again this year, with the 2nds competing in Kent Rural C and starting away to Old Gravesendians 2nd this weekend, while a Vets team will also play a handful of fixtures,

“It’s something we haven’t done for a few years,” Jones said. “We have a few guys who have come up to us and said they miss playing, two or three fixtures is enough to keep people interested, which is good.”

Sheppey Women, meanwhile, are set to start their league campaign on Sunday at home to Tunbridge Wells.