Doc lauds the bright talents in the City ranks
City midfielder Tommy Doherty has praised the talent and potential amongst the Grecians’ young squad, following a positive start to pre-season.
Doherty was amongst the spectators when a youthful Exeter side – with only 63 Football League appearances between them, excepting veteran striker Sam Parkin – took a 2-0 away from the trip to Clevedon. And the midfielder highlighted the talents of two fellow central midfielders in Matt Grimes and Jacob Jagger Cane as being exciting talents.
Doherty was amongst the spectators when a youthful Exeter side – with only 63 Football League appearances between them, excepting veteran striker Sam Parkin – took a 2-0 away from the trip to Clevedon. And the midfielder highlighted the talents of two fellow central midfielders in Matt Grimes and Jacob Jagger Cane as being exciting talents.
“We’ve got some really good young players,” said Tommy. “I enjoy playing with them and watching them play, and they’ve got a very good chance of having really good careers ahead of them.
“Matt Grimes is a very good footballer, and Caney is brilliant as well. They’re both very athletic and are very good players – I like them.”
Doherty was somewhat hampered towards the end of last season with a niggling back problem, but he is feeling fit and fresh now after the summer and isn’t feeling any recurrence in his injury. He was also happy with how the team performed in the first game back of pre-season against his old side QPR, having performed well to hold the Hoops to a goalless draw.
“It’s been good to be back; we’ve been eased in with a couple of hard runs, as you’d expect at this stage in pre-season,” he continued.
“I’m not feeling too bad at all, I’m just getting back into it now, and touch wood I’ll stay injury free. I missed a couple of games through my back injury, which was frustrating, but it’s not been too bad in the end. You forget about it when you play – you just try to do your best for your teammates.
“It went okay against QPR – obviously it was only our first game and we all only had 45 minutes. They were always going to have most of the ball but we kept our shape well.”
And Doherty confirmed that his future was never in question once he was offered a new deal to remain at St James Park for another season.
“Tis offered me a contract, and it was a no-brainer really. I enjoyed last year – he’s a pleasure to play for. Now we’ll try our best and hopefully it’ll be a good season.”