Harrogate Town's squad stronger than ever, but needs to be ahead of 'toughest' League Two campaign

Harrogate Town's playing squad and staff line-up ahead of the 2023/24 season. Pictures: Matt Kirkham

The Sulphurites kick-off their fourth League Two campaign at Doncaster Rovers this Saturday (3pm) having added eight new players to their squad over the course of summer.

Town appear to boast as much strength-in-depth as they have at any point during the previous three years, while their playing group also has a much more settled look about it compared to 12 months ago, when a huge overhaul saw Weaver add double that number during the summer transfer window.

But the Town boss insists that he needed to strengthen accordingly due to the standard he is expecting in the fourth tier this term.

Sulphurites boss Simon Weaver says he is 'aching' for the return of competitive football.

"I believe that this is the strongest squad that we have had since we’ve been a Football League club, but I say that without making any bold claims about which position I think we can finish in at the end of the season,” he told the Harrogate Advertiser.

“We’ve got good strength-in-depth, but we need it because of how tough this division is going to be.

“If you look at the profile of League Two this year, I don’t think it’s ever been higher. You consider the historically big clubs, look at who has come up and who has come down and I think this is probably the toughest League Two line-up I have seen, on paper.

"There are certainly no gimmes.”

On how he feels about facing such a challenge, Weaver added: “ I’m always excited for the start of a new season, but if anything, it's actually more exciting than ever this time around because of the profile of the league.

“There are a lot of big games to look forward to, there will be more televised fixtures than in previous years, huge clubs have dropped down from League One and big clubs have come up from the National League.

“We are ready to go and I’m really looking forward to playing for points again, I have been aching for that during the last few games of pre-season.

"I’m very happy with how our pre-season went, we got a lot out of it, but I can’t wait to have competitive fixtures back.”