Silkmen boss Keith Alexander, barring any last minute injuries, will have a full first team squad to choose from for this weekend's season opening at Shrewsbury.

And like all of us, the gaffer is excited by the challenge ahead and cannot wait for the action to start.

"We've had a good pre-season and thankfully come through it unscathed so I am in the fortunate position of being able to choose from a full squad of players," explained Keith. "I've already decided the starting line up but will be keeping that to myself for the time being."

"I've certainly learnt a lot during pre-season and feel as a manager I now have more options than when we reported back last month which is extremely pleasing. That's one of the key tasks of the games we have played so to that extent I feel we are in a better position to take on Shrewsbury then perhaps say a few weeks ago."

"Paul Simpson has spent a bit of money in the summer to re-shape his squad and quite rightly his team are seen by many as one of the favourites to get promoted. But with that comes some added pressure and that is something we can turn to our advantage as I suspect most people will have Saturday's game down as a home win. Sometimes when a squad has been overhauled it takes time to settle so there's no reason why we shouldn't go there and give a good account of ourselves."

"The same could be said of the game against Bradford the following weekend. But you have to play everyone at some stage, so why not now?"

"The most important thing is that we get off to a good start, stick to our game plan and ensure we execute it to the best of our abilities. Tha's all I can ask of the lads. We've worked hard to cut out the mistakes that can cost you so all in all I am excited and hope we can reward those Silkmen and women planning to make the trip over on Saturday."

Read more from Keith tomorrow (Fri) when we will be running his 'In the Spotlight' feature that addresses such diverse things as goal line technology and Barry Fry!