Marc Weatherstone is fairly sure he has never uttered the words before but he declared himself very content with the state of Welwyn Garden City's pre-season so far - even in the aftermath of a friendly defeat against Enfield Town.

The 2-1 loss to the new National League South outfit at Herns Lane was the Citizens' third warm-up game of the summer and their second defeat.

It was also the one that filled him with the most pleasure and means he is now happy that WGC are right where they should be at this stage of the campaign.

"If I'm honest, before this game, I wouldn't have said so," he admitted, "but it’s very hard at this stage because you are playing mix and match teams with trialists.

"We played Colney Heath and for the first half of the of that game, we played well but the in the second half we were poor. 

"Then we went to Codicote and we were really poor because I was changing the team and tinkering. 

"We beat them 5-1 but they’re a step seven outfit so in theory that should be the score line or perhaps even more. I think we should have been more dominant. 

"But when you're changing teams, you’re trying to find the right relationships in terms of the pairing at the back or in midfield or up front. 

"So before Enfield, I would have said we're not where I want. 

"This has shown me a little bit more but I think the next step is to start putting a team in place that will be starting the season. 

"They need to start working together as a team. 

"Players are giving me headache, which is good. I can only pick 16 in the match day squad and some will be the 17th or 18th or 19th man. 

"But I can now look forward and work with the players because I need to recruit from here or there." 

Bailey Stevenson had put City in front against Enfield in the first half with a fine finish but Enfield were gifted an equaliser in the first minute of the second half as a trialist keeper couldn't stop a shot falling behind him and in.

However, the Towners were only able to snatch victory six minutes from time and the performance of the Citizens, especially in the first half, was exactly what the boss wanted.

Weatherstone said: "I'm really happy. Not happy result as I’m never happy at losing, but you have to look at the two sides. 

"We’re playing a National League South team and I thought we held our own throughout, the first half slightly better than the second. 

"But it's always good when you get more positives than negatives from a game. 

"We’re not far off, the levels of fitness showed which just shows we need to do a little bit more, but I was really happy with what we've been building up to. 

"We’ve changed the formation, we have new personnel who have got to gel, but I’m actually quite happy with that. 

"It's the first time you’ll hear me say I'm happy with like a loss but the performance was there. 

"If we can maintain that and keep improving, I think we'll start well."