AFC Bournemouth women played out a 2-2 draw with Portsmouth in their second pre-season friendly at Ringwood Town. 

A penalty from Helen Bleazard, as well as a converted rebound from Pearl Mortimer in the second half, ensured there was nothing to separate the Cherries from tier three side Portsmouth. 

Following the match, manager Steve Cuss caught up with afcb.co.uk about the match itself and what the rest of pre-season looks like for his side. He touched upon the following topics: 

The opposition... 

"It was a good performance against a very strong Portsmouth side. I'm pleased with how we shaped up in a very competitive game. 

"It was part of the pre-season process, we certainly wanted a challenge in terms of the competition and who we played. We wanted to be worked defensively and we worked hard to create things for ourselves as well. It was a good test and a key part of the pre-season process ahead of the new campaign. I'm delighted for the players, who showed up fitness-wise and ability-wise."

Getting minutes... 

"Playing matches is a huge part of pre-season. You can do all the fitness work but there's nothing quite like playing games out on the pitch. This was our second game and we've got a little bit of a gap until the last one. It was great to be out there and it would've done all the players the world of good to get minutes in the tank.

Next up... 

"We've got a friendly against Dorking now which we're looking forward to. There's then the training camp down in Devon, which will give us the opportunity to do even more work with the day time available. We can put on even more sessions and it's a good chance to get the squad together ahead of the new season. We'll then have a couple more internal games to get ready before we're straight in."