A stunning weak-footed effort from Lewis Coyle opened the scoring before experienced striker Wes York equalised for the visitors. 

The away side brought a big squad to the Velocity Stadium and made seven changed on the hour mark, giving the Hoops a much more energetic opposition to play against and Ross Jenkins was pleased with the thorough workout.

"It was a good game and a tough game as well." Jenkins told us after the game.

"Brackley are a good team. They play good football, they're very structured and very tough to beat.

"It was good to get the early goal, and they scored a nice goal themselves, so overall I thought it was quite an even game. It was important that our players got minutes in their legs but overall I thought it was a good performance."

The season is creeping up on teams in the Vanarama National League with the big kick-off only two weeks away. City have one more pre-season test to play against Gloucester City [Saturday 30th July] and the gaffer is happy with how the team is progressing.

"Ninety minutes is really important to get into the players' legs.

"Some of our general play was really good and I was really entertained with that. The boys felt good and although the last five/ten minutes was a leggy period for us, we're getting closer to the 6th [August, City's opening league game] and It's really important we gradually increase our minutes so that when we go into the first game of the season we should be ready to go.

"We didn't want to change the team too much on purpose. It was a great test for us, they brought some bodies on and they were a bit fresher which meant we needed to work harder and that was beneficial for us.

"I thought the game panned out really evenly and our systems were working well. It was a great workout for us."

After a busy week on the transfer front, the game also saw a number of new faces take to the pitch. Andre Burley, Aaron Williams-Bushell & Klaidi Lolos all started the first-half whilst Lewis Miccio and Tom Harrison were second-half substitutes and the gaffer is happy with how the new players are settling in.

"Hopefully we can build a nice tight group here. Everyone's getting on well, everyone's sharing the workload and getting the work done so it's so far, so good.

"It's important that we keep our standards, they've [the new players] have earned their place in our camp by doing good things so it's important they keep their standards high as well and we'll demand that from the boys who have stayed too.

"We have to set new targets and new standards now and this is the perfect opportunity to do that now."