Canterbury City manager Keith Bird’s first meeting against former club Holmesdale has come around quicker than he would have liked.

Bird will come up against familiar faces this Saturday when his new side host Holmesdale, where Bird had been chairman prior to joining City as first-team boss last month.

Looking ahead to the Southern Counties East Premier Division match at Salters Lane, Bird said: “Ideally, I would have preferred not to have played Holmesdale this early in my tenure at Canterbury.

“Obviously, I spent just under a year at Holmesdale as their chairman.

“They’re a great bunch of people at Holmesdale - from the committee, to the manager (Lee Roots) and the staff, and the players. I think very highly of all of them.

“I would prefer we were not playing them quite so early - just out of respect, really.

"But they have got a great manager, a great management team and some really talented players in that squad.

“I think it’s going to be a really interesting game and, hopefully, an entertaining game for the fans.

“I’m looking forward to seeing them all and shaking their hands.”

City have been in improved form under Bird but have had an 11-day break following their 1-0 defeat at title-chasing Sheppey last Tuesday.

They have pulled away from the bottom two in the league but City, who are 15th, have played more matches than the two immediately below them.

Bird conceded: “We would have rather have kept going, with a bit of momentum. Our tails were up.

“But, at the same time, we have been carrying a few injuries. We’ve never had the full squad available since I took over.”

Bird, assisted by Dan Lawrence, Sam Wilson and goalkeeping coach Ada Gower, have kept together much of the squad Lawrence and Wilson had been operating with during their caretaker reign.

But one man now back on the field is experienced midfielder Lawrence himself - who caught Bird’s eye during his time at Holmesdale.

Bird explained: “Being able to get Dan back in that centre-midfield role was really important to me.

“Interestingly, when I was at Holmesdale and we played Canterbury earlier in the season, there were a few Canterbury players - who are no longer with us unfortunately - that I had on my target list of players which interested me. Ironically, Dan was one of those.

“Having Sam and Ada alongside me has freed Dan up to go back in and give some of that experience and leadership out there on the field to the younger players.

“So I’m really pleased we’ve been able to do that.”

City are still on the hunt for a new ground, with Faversham Town having not decided to extend their lease beyond this season.

Bird said: “The board are working on that.

“A number of discussions are under way but no announcement is available at this time. Hopefully, there will be an announcement soon.

“The board are working extremely hard to get something organised in time for next season.”

Perhaps surprisingly to some, Faversham Town last week announced they will now ground-share with Division 1 Faversham Strike Force instead, despite their Salters Lane pitch being criticised by some.

Bird was not surprised by that news, stating: “They gave us plenty of notice that they weren’t going to renew with us.

“We know they were keen to help Strike Force as another local side.

“While we are disappointed to leave, they gave us advanced warning ahead of that announcement, which we were grateful for.

"It allowed us to start to get things moving on our side.”