Horsham manager Di Paola relishing Dorking Wanderers friendly test

The Hornets will visit Meadowbank Stadium to take on National League South outfit at 3pm tomorrow.

A number of ex-Dorking players have made the move to The Camping World Community Stadium in recent seasons.

Summer signings Sam Howes and Tom Richards have previously represented the Wanderers, while ex-Hornets Jerry O’Sullivan, Lewis Taylor and David Ray were acquired from Dorking.

Di Paola is looking forward to pitting his wits against his good friend, Wanderers' founder, chairman, and manager Marc White, and hopes his new boys can seamlessly blend into the squad.

He said: “It’ll be nice to play them. They’re favourites for the National South so it’ll be a tough challenge.

“It’ll be nice to see a few supporters at games and Marc is a good mate of mine up at Dorking.

“It’ll give us a really good test as to where we are fitness wise but we can only go from there.

“Hopefully we can get some of our ideas out. But unfortunately with all the players coming and going we just want to get everyone back to where they need to be.

“It’s going to take a little bit of time for players to gel.

“We’ve got some ideas of what we want to do and we need to try to get that into these games. There’s a lot of work to do.”