Adam Lakeland excited as Morecambe return home for their final pre-season matches
Morecambe complete their pre-season preparations with two home matches this week.
Adam Lakeland is looking forward to his home debut as Morecambe manager when they play a first pre-season match at the Halo Aerospace Stadium on Tuesday.
After half-a-dozen games on the road in preparation for the National League North season, Lakeland’s players conclude their build-up with two home matches in four days.
AFC Fylde are the Shrimps’ opponents on Tuesday (7pm), followed by the visit of Barrow AFC on Saturday (3pm).
Speaking after last weekend’s win at Bury, Lakeland said: “We’re ready for it and I’m sure the supporters are too.
“We’ve obviously played every game away from home so far.
“The surfaces, probably outside of the Fleetwood (Town) one, they’ve not been the best.
“That’s no criticism to anybody that we’ve played. Today, we’ve been on 3G; we’ve been on 3G every day in pre-season, virtually, so we’ve been on this too much for my liking.
“It is what it is, just the circumstances around the grass pitches at the training ground and the pitch at the stadium not being started until probably a bit later than maybe you would have liked.
“We’ve got on with it and the grass pitches we have played on in pre-season, probably outside of Fleetwood, have been very dry and sticky.
“That’s no criticism of anybody, it’s just the British weather for once; it’s been incredibly warm and it’s so difficult for anybody to keep pitches wet and have that slickness to them.
“Because of all those factors, I’m really looking forward to seeing us play at home because Tom (Wells, head groundsman) and his team have done a great job with the pitch in such a short space of time.
“It looks really good and I know it’ll play a hell of a lot better. Hopefully that’ll help us have a lot more fluidity about our play.
“Playing Fylde, who won the National League North last year, that’s going to be a good test for us, just as Barrow will be at the weekend.
“I feel like we’re ready for that home game, we’re ready to play on a good pitch that will hopefully be a bit more conducive to how we want to play the game.
“We’re going to be on there against two National League teams that are only going to challenge us even further, so I’m looking forward to these next couple of games.”