Jim Bentley and AFC Fylde can't wait to return to work at York

It’s 11 weeks since Coasters boss Bentley underwent heart surgery but in the second half of that period away his team haven’t played.

Since National League North ‘resumed’ after a two-week suspension the vast majority of games have been postponed, many because clubs are unwilling to play until they know the result of their vote on whether to scrap a season blighted by Covid and a cash crisis.

But tonight two clubs determined to complete the season are due to contest the first match at York’s new LNER Community Stadium (7.45) and no-one is more excited than Bentley.

He told the club website: “We are back playing football. We are a full-time professional club, as York are. You train all week and you want to have a game, and we look forward to getting a game on.

“We are doing everything we can as a club with regards to testing and following protocols, and the lads just want to play because that’s their profession.

“Watching the players and staff, you can see that everyone is chomping at the bit. We have been building up and preparing right for each game and for whatever reason they haven’t taken place. But now it’s all systems go for York.”

Assistant Nick Chadwick has taken charge in the absence of Bentley, who has stepped up his return to training in recent weeks and will attend his first match this evening.

He added: “I’ve watched the games on a stream and still had an input. I’ve been speaking to the staff regularly, mostly to Chaddy a couple of times a day, but there’s nothing like being back in the thick of it and back to normality.

“I don’t know whether I’ll be in the dugout straight away. I haven’t shouted for two months, except to tell my kids their tea is on the table, so I’ll have to get back into all that but I’ll certainly be there.”

He admits match preparation has been challenging but hopefully will be rewarded with a game tonight.

“We are in such mad times,” said Bentley. “When do you ever reach mid-February having only played 14 league games? When do you have a five-week break in the middle of a season?

“We’ve prepared for this game like all the others. You plan your week and do all your analysis and tactical work, and in some cases we’ve picked the team ready to go. All we’ve been waiting for is to rock up on matchday for kick-off and then it’s not happened for whatever reason. So you scrap that and move on to the next one, and York is no different.

“It will be a tough game against one of the fancied sides. We’ve looked at their strengths and weaknesses, though like ourselves it’s a few weeks since they played.

“We won our last two games and are in a good place. Confidence is high but momentum has been stemmed by the break. It would be nice to carry on as we left off but who knows what is around the corner?

“You don’t know how players will adapt. York and ourselves have been training for five weeks and it’s down to which club adapts to that break.

“We’ve had an in-house friendly and you could see inside 10 minutes that the lads were a little rusty.

“Hopefully we have a successful night but you never know how it will play out.”

But first and foremost, Bentley has been through enough himself lately to keep everything in perspective.

“All this stuff going on about loans, grants, null and void, teams refusing to play, the weather and all the stuff that’s been going on for the last few months, the most important thing is that everyone is safe and well through this horrible disease.”

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