Priestley Farquharson out to make up for lost time

The 27-year-old has a full pre-season under his belt heading into the new campaign and is confident he can showcase his ability once again - starting with the visit of Morecambe today.

He said: “It’s always a positive going into the season feeling fresh.

“Hopefully I can show on the pitch what I’ve been working on during pre-season.

“Injuries are always more of a mental battle than it’s physical. I had a few last season, which was annoying and it felt like it set me back.

“All you’ve got to do is try to get back strong. It’s all about keeping a positive mindset.

“All of the guys in the backroom staff helped me get through it.”

Walsall eventually missed out on the League Two play-offs by five points as they finished 11th last term.

Thirteen players were retained from the previous campaign, while David Okagbue and Josh Gordon have signed permanently following loans from Stoke City and Burton Albion respectively.

Farquharson believes the continuity within the squad coupled with the new additions should provide them with a strong platform to improve on last season.

“We want to build off what we did last season. We kept a good core which should give us a foundation to push on,” he continued.

“We’ve made some additions. Flash (Josh Gordon) is back, Tommy (Simkin) in goal, which is almost like for like for Jacko (Jackson Smith).

“So we’ve got that core and we just need to be positive and confident going into each game because we know we can do it.

“It’s League Two, it’s not rocket science, so we just need to be together and we can achieve what we’re looking to achieve.”