LES WHITTON believes his side's tricky opening-day fixture may well play into their hands.
Brentwood Town will kick off the Ryman League Division One North campaign on August 10 with a trip to face title favourites Maldon & Tiptree.
Maldon were beaten in last season's play-off final after at one stage being 15 points clear at the top of the table, and are the bookies' tip to go one further this time around.
Whitton's side are considered mid-table candidates with odds of 16-1, but he believes a tough opener will help his side.
"We don't mind that," he said. "We've got to play them sometime.
"The opening day of the season is always very competitive, everyone wants to win the first game, so it might be a bit of an advantage to go away to one of the top sides and see what we're made of. I'm looking forward to that, then we've got a couple of home games that may be winnable, so it's a good start for us.
"They did well last year, they just missed out and I think they'll be wanting to put that right this year.
"But it's 11 against 11 and we'll give a good account of ourselves.
"You can make of the odds what you want. I think there will be a couple of sides up there but the rest are going to be much of a muchness.
"I think Needham Market will probably be the favourites, Maldon up there with them, Redbridge are spending a lot of money.
"But there's a lot of points to be played for so I think we've got as much chance of taking them as anybody."
Whitton fielded two separate sides in friendlies on Saturday, one team drawing 2-2 at Harold Hill and another losing 4-2 at Barking, but it has helped him narrow down his squad.
And he admits there were some hard decisions to be made when he let some players go.
"I've let boys go who are technically excellent players," he added.
"But the nature of this league, you can't just have technical players, you've got to have a mixture of people who will give you 100 per cent every game and work hard for the team.
"It has been difficult but we've got a good mixture of players now, so we can beef it up if we want to and we've got players who can play as well."
Whitton has his first home game back at the Brentwood Arena on Thursday night when his former club – and current Ryman League Division One North champions – Grays visit on Thursday night.
And he said: "It's an opportunity for the players we've got left to go into a match situation and play against a good side.
"They've won their last two games 10-0, I was there last year so I know what they're all about, they're a good, strong side, they won their last 15 games on the spin and deserve to be in the Premier on the back of that.
"They haven't changed much, so it's a good opportunity to see where we are at the moment. But we've still got another six or seven games left, so a defeat won't be the be all and end all – but it will give us the opportunity to improve on the things we need to improve on."