Whitstable boss Lloyd Blackman is excited by the quality that new arrival Leo Mazzone will bring to The Belmont.

Nevertheless, the former Ebbsfleet and East Grinstead midfielder must rediscover his full fitness before the Oystermen fully benefit from his talent.

Mazzone came off the bench to make his debut for the club in Saturday’s 3-2 defeat to Burgess Hill Town.

Blackman said: “Leo has been training with us for a few weeks, he needs to get his fitness up.

“He will be a very good player for us and we’ve had some good honest conversations about where his fitness needs to be.

“He’s working hard behind the scenes to get to a point where he can be competing for starting spots, we’ll do everything we can to help him do that.

“He’s a top player and a top lad, we just have to manage him.

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“When you summarise it, his technical ability is very good, he’s a strong and physical player which offers us a different dimension and he can play anywhere across the midfield.

“He’s got the ability to score goals and control games, but we want to get his fitness above where it is at the moment.

“Then we’ll have a player on our hands.”

Whitstable are still waiting on the fitness of several players ahead of Saturday’s extra preliminary round FA Trophy clash at Chalfont St Peter, including Marcus Evans who looks set for a spell on the sidelines.

Blackman added: “We’re monitoring TJ (Jadama) and Tom Bryant, they should be fit, we’d be disappointed if they aren’t given how they’ve responded.

“Marcus Evans looks a longer issue, Girty (Luke Girt) was unavailable on Saturday but he’ll be available. We had four key players out, when you look at what they give us they have been fundamental to how we’ve done, I think they were missed.

“Marcus felt like he opened his knee up when he went in for a blocked tackle, it’s been niggling him throughout the season.

“He’s done rehab work but I think it will be minimum two to three weeks out.”

Blackman will be seeking a response from his players after Saturday’s display, with defensive errors again proving costly.

“I thought we started brightly and should have been two or three clear, we hit the post a few times and caused them problems,” he said.

“We just had a spell 15 minutes before half-time where we gifted them a goal, which was out of character and it changed the complexion of the game.

“When you break the game down and look at how they got their goals it’s errors that we can eradicate.”

Whitstable are at Cray Valley PM in the Kent Senior Cup on Tuesday.

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