IRVINE Meadow boss Jamie McKim says his side will be out to win a second consecutive title this season.
The North Ayrshire outfit are set to make their WoSFL Premier Division return on Saturday, July 25, as they host St Roch's.
Off the back of an impressive First Division title win last season, McKim is hoping to see his side competing for silverware once again.
“You want to improve every week," he said. "You want the team to keep getting better, you don’t want to take any backwards steps.
“I’m an ambitious manager and I’m at an ambitious club, we just need to keep pushing and hopefully, come May next year, we’re right up there again.
“That’s where I want to be, we don’t need to be afraid of going into that league. There are good sides in there that we’ll show a healthy respect.
“But we want to be up there challenging and, I’m not going to hide from it, we want to win that league again.”
McKim feels his Meadow squad is shaping up nicely ahead of the campaign getting underway though says he hopes to make further additions in the near future.
He commented: “I still think we need a few, to make sure we’re up there, but I’m happy that we’ll definitely compete.
“If you’re at a club like Irvine Meadow, you need to be in it to win it, it’s a big club which demands success.
“We had a great season last year, for me, we have retained the strongest 75 per cent of the squad. There hasn’t really been any regulars that have left.
“Then the additions so far make a difference. Ross Davidson and Stephen Docherty are really experienced, Jack Whittaker has been brilliant since he came in. Owen Carey is slightly different, he’s younger but he’s a top player.
“We’re strengthening and I think, at this moment in time, that the 11 I have just now is better than the 11 I had last year but I need to add a bit of strength in depth to make sure the squad is as strong as it was.”
The Meadow Park boss feels that his side's pre-season endeavours will also stand them in good stead having taken on, almost exclusively, teams from divisions above.
He added: “The only game which I felt was really difficult was the East Kilbride one, they were far superior to us.
“They’re a League One team, they are a possession-based team, that’s something we aspire to be and we want to go through the levels with that.
“Other than that, I felt we were good against Talbot and Clydebank then we beat Glenvale and Troon.
“I’m happy with what I seen in pre-season because I got to see where we are strong and where we need to get better, it was positive all round.
“There is no point in taking on games where you’re going to win by goals all the time, you need to get tested and see the areas you can develop. I think that’s what we got.”
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