Ottery St Mary may well be a one-team club in the very near future, writes Steve Birley.

For a club of Ottery’s standing that would be a crying shame, but it’s a situation that seems to be happening at a lot of clubs this season – especially after the recent spell of almost two months without football.

At a midweek training session just nine players turned up.

First team boss Dave Fairweather says: “I sent a text out to 40 different players this past week and the initial response I got was 16 saying yes, two letting me know they were unavailable and the rest, well your guess is as good as mine!”

He continued: “It’s shame as we have a smashing club at Ottery, but do seem to have enough committed players to field two teams.”

Fairweather takes his team to Hatherleigh for their latest Fresha League Division Five outing. Adam Harris is unavailable as he is on a training course and James Gosney is also missing. Given that the Otters beat Hatherleigh 7-1 in December, does complacency worry Fairweather?

He says: “I’ll not accept any form of complacency and I’d like to think the players understand that. Those lads that are currently committed to the cause are a great bunch of very genuine footballers and I am confident that, if we can keep the momentum going and ensure good availability then we can go on and get a second successive promotion.

“However, for me the bigger picture is that a club of our size and one that carries the ambitions we do, needs two teams and I, for one, would lament the loss of a second team.”