Yate Town 2 Frome Town 4

IT is just over a week until Yate Town get their Evo-Stik Southern League Division One South and West campaign off and running for another term and manager Paul Britton's new-look team are slowly beginning to take shape.

There is still a long way to go for the Bluebells to become a cohesive unit who know each other's game inside out but the acorns are taking root.

Tuesday’s clash at Lodge Road, the first time many of the squad had played on what will become their home ground through 2016/17, saw Britton give a number of Yate wannabes the chance to show off their talents against Evo-Stik Southern Premier Division outfit Frome Town.

And Frome proved a far harder nut to crack than Yate’s previous friendly last week, which saw them thrash Brislington 6-1 away.

The initial signs were that Yate were still a bit of a mishmash of strangers on a football field and their sloppy defence was evidence of it.

Indeed, Yate found themselves a goal down inside four minutes when Frome's Jon Davies, who was to prove to be a thorn for most of the night, smashed a free-kick into the near left corner of the home net that Gareth Bale would have raised a smile about.

Frome were a quality side and had Yate under the cosh at times, and with the Bluebells delivering possession to their opponents, they were doing themselves no favours.

And it told when Frome got around the back of the home defensive line for a cross to find Rob Hobbs in a point blank position to fire home his side's second.

But Yate found their feet and, from a free kick on the right from Camen Harvey, Sacha Tong fired home a very good header from six yards to beat the Frome keeper hands down and put Yate just a goal in arrears.

Britton rang the changes after the break to give as many of his bench a run as possible - and to give him an idea off who could be challenging for a starting place in that first league match away at Barnstaple Town on Saturday week.

And at this stage, the result was fairly unimportant which was all the better as the Bluebells went 3-1 down on 48 minutes.

Yate had some chances to grab a second goal, but the majority of shots were coming from Frome and peppering their own sticks towards the hour mark.

However, the Bluebells tenacity paid off with just over twenty minutes to go as a lovely free kick on the right was floated to the far post where tall Matt Guy was waiting to head the ball back across the box and off the post into the net.

Then, from being the hustled, the Bluebells turned hustlers as they shot and headed in the danger zone only to be denied or see their chance fly over the bar.

But Frome had the final say as a ball into the penalty area found Davies unopposed to round the keeper and score into an empty net.

It was 4-2 at the final whistle but not a result that Yate deserved.