AFTER the shortest possible pre-season, that somehow felt like the longest wait in recorded history, competitive football is back.

In just two short days we begin our campaign to escape the National League at home to Eastleigh.

At the time of writing there are a handful of tickets remaining, but I am pretty confident they will go before 3pm on Saturday giving us a sell-out crowd to roar the boys on to what we hope will be a first three points of the season.

It has been an unusual, but, I think, effective pre-season.

The schedule was more ad hoc than any of us would have liked, after an enforced last-minute change, but ultimately it provided the team with what it needed: Fitness and Togetherness.

The retention of so many of last year's players meant that a core of experienced Wrexham players have been able to welcome in the new players and aid them in their assimilation.

The recruitment of Mark Howard, Jordan Tunnicliffe, Elliot Lee, Anthony Forde, Sam Dalby and Jacob Mendy has not been without its challenges, but ultimately has provided us with a very strong team and squad in advance of the start of the season, and I can't wait to see what they can all do in the red shirt. And the blue one. And the white one. Also, the purple one for the keepers.

I want to pay tribute to Phil Parkinson, scout Chris Johnson, Les Reed and most of all Shaun Harvey for the identification, verification and confirmation of our targets, respectively.

It has, perhaps, been our most successful window in terms of identifying and securing our targets. We came in with six positions in mind and have now successfully filled each slot.

There will be some changes around The Racecourse that fans will see when they get back into the stadium on Saturday.

The Directors' and Executive Room boxes have been re-arranged, a new accessible platform for away supporters was given a test run against Macclesfield, the 1864 Suite has been revamped and the new scoreboard is installed.

Less visible is the work that has been done to the dressing rooms and medical facilities as well as the installation of the new recovery gym complex which is in various stages of completion.

This is my last column in The Leader, which has made an excellent home for it over the last 18 months or so.

Going forward, this column will appear on the club's website every Thursday, where, I presume, I haven't checked, I will be allowed to swear and write the column I really want to write, which is just me picking fights with people who've been mean to me on Twitter.

I'd like to thank everybody at The Leader for playing host to me for the last year and a half and encourage Wrexham fans to continue making The Leader their first stop for all Wrexham AFC news.

Here's to a big three points on Saturday.