Falmouth Town's gaffer Andrew Westgarth remarked that their defeat to Tavistock on the opening day of pre-season gave him 'some food for thought'.

South West Peninsula League West (SWPL) champions of last season Falmouth were beaten 5-0 by the reigning champions of the Western League at Langsford Park.

A second half hat trick from debutant Adam McPherson plus strikes from Ed Harrison and Josh Grant secured the win for the Lambs on the day.

The match was the first of a challenging pre-season which sees Town pit themselves against three teams who play in divisions above them. They also play Sidmouth Town of the SWPL East plus Wadebridge Town and St Blazey from the SWPL west.

Speaking to the Packet since the fixture Westgarth said: "You never want to lose any game of football, the pre-season games were selected for a reason. I wanted it to be a gauge or a marker of where we are at, obviously the second half we both made so many changes so I am not going to read into that too much.

"First half there were definitely areas we need to work on. It highlighted our shortfalls and that is what pre-season is all about.

"No disrespect but I didn't want to be playing too many St Piran or Peninsula league sides because that is what we had last year. We wanted to test ourselves and there's no bigger than last seasons Western League champions.

"They had a few missing so it wasn't their full strength side but they still had quality players. It was a game of fine margins, we could have easily gone 1-0 up but for large spells they were very dominant. But it has definitely given me some food for thought."

"I wouldn't say we were great, but as I say that is what pre-season is all about. It's the fine margins actually, they showed their quality when they scored, they didn't have too many chances but when they did they took them. That is what we expected playing against that level of quality.

"I thought that their new debutants did very well, they can take a lot of positives from it. From our point of view we are bitterly disappointed. We never want to lose any game of football but it has given me that appetite to work on where we need to improve."

Town have made two additions to their squad so far this season with Kayden Gordon-Dunn and James Swan joining the squad from Truro City Reserves.

The two made their debuts against Tavistock and when asked about the prospect of any potential further signings the Falmouth manager said: "We have been quite lucky with the squad we have a very good squad at the minute, recruitment is always the case of if the right player comes up we will look at it.

"At the minute we are happy with the squad. There are always areas you can look and see if you can improve on, but you have to look at we probably signed one of our best acquisitions ten games into last season in Jack Bray-Evans so lots can happen.

"Some teams have quite big squads, from that you naturally get wastage and in that players become available.

"I am not going to panic we have a good squad and the main challenge of pre-season, is getting the squad together because we started so early this year. People are still on holiday, or have things to do with their family so that is the biggest challenge."

Town's next match is at home to Truro City in the annual Aubrey Wilkes trophy at Bickland Park this Saturday, July 9. Kick off at 3pm.