Iron manager Russ Wilcox has expressed his excitement following the release of the 2014-2015 season fixtures on Wednesday morning.
The campaign begins with a trip to Swindon Town before United welcome Preston North End and then Fleetwood Town to Glanford Park.An away game at Yeovil completes August and whilst Wilcox admits that a tough start lies in store for his squad, he’s looking forward to the challenge of League One football.
He told The Iron Player: “It’s a tough start but it was always going to be.
“We’ve just been promoted so we’re excited by it and there are some great fixtures in there for us.
“I’d have preferred to have started at home but you get what you get. We were at home last season so we can’t really complain and we had a great away record last season so we’ll go there (Swindon) in a positive frame of mind.
“There are lots of local derbies and the first one that jumps out is Doncaster at home on 4 October.
“It’s an exciting time for the football club, I think when you’ve just been promoted you always look at the big clubs in there so it’s an exciting day.”
Scunthorpe face a number of long distance away games early on in the season with the likes of Swindon, Yeovil, Bristol City and Gillingham all pencilled in by mid-October.
Christmas is always a hectic time for every club but the Iron can look forward to a couple of local games around the festive period with matches at Bradford City and Sheffield United.
The season ends with a mouth-watering clash at the Keepmoat Stadium against Doncaster Rovers and Wilcox is now pleased that he can start making plans for the new season.
“I think the fact that we’ve got a few long away trips early is probably a positive,” he continued.
“You’re hoping the weather is going to be positive in that period so I think getting the four long away trips out of the way before the winter months is good.
“One of the first things I do look for is the fixtures around the Christmas period because it’s always important to try and marry that with family life.
“We don’t have that far to travel so it will be terrific for the supporters. We’ve had much longer away distances during that time in the past so I’m sure the supporters will be looking at that and seeing lots of positives there.
“Obviously we finish off at Doncaster as well but that’s a long way off and there is lots of planning and lots of things to do before then but you’re hoping it’s an exciting time to finish.
“They’re all tough fixtures and everyone has to play each other twice, home and away so we’ll sit down and we can now start planning.”
The draw for the first round of the Capital One Cup was also made on Tuesday morning and United face a game against Championship side Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park, sandwiched in between the league games with Swindon and Preston.
And with plenty of big games to look forward to throughout the campaign, Wilcox has stated that the squad will embrace the fixture list and look to be positive in the games they play.
He added: “With the way the Capital One Cup is set up now with the seeded teams, it was always going to be a tough game but I think it’s a great draw for us.
“They’re ex Premiership winners, they have a fantastic stadium and we can go there and enjoy the occasion.
“They’ll be expected to win but again you get what you get and we’ll certainly go there and give it a good go.
“There are lots of big matches for us over the season against some big teams and that’s why you want to move up the leagues, to go to better stadiums to better football clubs.
“It’s going to be a difficult year, we know that, but we want to be really competitive and we’re going to approach it with positivity.”
Just six days remain now until the players return for pre-season testing before the start of full pre-season training on 3 July.
And the Scunthorpe boss is hoping to secure a new signing in time for next Tuesday but says it’s something the club are still working on.
He said: “Darren Simpson the fitness guy will come in and we’ll have a look to see where the players are.
“I don’t see it being a problem for anybody, I’ve done it previously at other clubs and it’s always worked well.
“It just keeps you on your toes throughout the summer months knowing that you’ve got that testing day and if people don’t come up to scratch then there’s some work to be done.
“We’re also hoping to get somebody across the line in the next few days
“That would be a positive for the football club, to add to the group we’ve got so it’s something we’re working on.”
See much more from Russ Wilcox on The Iron Player.