Worthing kick off with three straight away games - but Hinsh is not worried

The club plan further work to improve their troublesome artificial pitch at Woodside Road, meaning they are unlikely to play at home until October.

That means their opening three league fixtures will take them to Folkestone, Kingstonian and Lewes and they’ll have an FA Cup tie away from Worthing – all within the first 12 days of the competitive season.

Hinshelwood said it would be a big early test for his squad but one he was confident they could deal with.

“I do take the view you have to play everyone home and away in a league season, and at some point we’ll end up with a run of home games,” he told the Herald.

“The main thing is that we’re just glad we’re about to be playing competitive football again after six months. Everyone is desperate to get back to doing that.”

Worthing continued their programme of friendlies with a 2-2 draw at Chichester City on Tuesday night, with Ollie Pearce and Tom Chalaye on target.

Hinshelwood said it was a good test from a home team who put plenty of men behind the ball and made Worthing work for chances – something plenty of Isthmian premier teams are likely to do following the Rebels’ success last term.

But midfielder Danny Barker ended the night facing at least a couple of weeks on the sidelines after being injured by a first-half tackle.

Hinshelwood said he had a number of injuries he hoped would clear up by the time the first league game arrived on September 19.

“It’s not ideal – we have a few more injuries to deal with than we’d like at this stage. But we have two-and-a-bit weeks before that first match so hopefully a lot of them will clear.”

Worthing go to Three Bridges for a friendly on Saturday but have no other pre-season games planned after that.

That will give Hinshelwood and his staff around five sessions before kick-off and he said competition for places was looking good. The form of 18-year-old Chalaye, who has scored a number of goals in the friendlies, is one of the bright spots as Worthing aim for another season of success, this time ending with promotion.