Lordswood Football Club have made a decision on next season’s management team as they look to bounce back from relegation.

Lords finished bottom of the Southern Counties East Premier Division and will be battling it out in Division 1 next season.

Scott Porter was appointed manager towards the end of the season but was unable to turn the tide as relegation was eventually confirmed.

He’d already stated his desire to stay on next season, and the Medway club have opted to keep him on board for next season.

Porter will mete with the club’s board tomorrow night (Wednesday) and will once again be joined by Mark Lane in the dugout as his assistant, while Shaun Welford will be coming in as first-team coach and Dillon Rogers as assistant coach.

He said: “We've put a plan in place that we all agreed on and we're looking forward to working together to get the club back where it should be, and done properly, doing it my way from the start.

“I’m looking forward to getting my teeth into it.

“It was very, very difficult coming in with seven games remaining. We all knew it was a massive ask with the time scale and the teams we were playing against and the position we were in, that was the reality.

“But we can't look back now. You live and learn from the mistakes and you don't make them happen again.

“The main thing now is to be positive and get cracking and that's exactly what I've been doing since I left the meeting last night.

“I've got a list of players. I know it's early days and there's going to be many a phone call, many a conversation, many a movement of players and people, some players make a decision early, some people don't and it goes on and there's more twists and turns later on in pre-season.

“It’s about getting everything in place, all the sessions lined up regarding times when we go back and try and get the pre-season friendlies done as quick as possible.

“Shaun Welford's joining me, which is something I've always wanted to happen. He couldn't commit when I took over seven games ago but he's now on board, so we’ve had a little bit of a reshuffle.”

Lordswood suffered a 3-0 home defeat in their final SCEFL Premier Division game of the season last Saturday.

Lords already knew they were down and Porter took the opportunity to give a number of the club’s under-23 players a run-out in the first-team against Stansfeld.

It was goalless in the opening half, but their young keeper Oliver Dubois, on his first start, conceded early in the second half.

Edmund Crosland and Jewu Mahama, from the club’s under-23s, started the match while Harry House came off the bench for his first appearance. Harley Lawrence-Gabriel and Rameses Meseorisa also featured.

Stansfeld added goals on 63 and 73 minutes to complete the victory.