ALEX Neil is happy to get his Norwich City squad back together at St George’s Park this week as they ramp up their preparations for the 2015-16 Barclays Premier League campaign.

Neil and the majority of his players will be training and staying at the FA’s widely-heralded national football centre from Wednesday until Sunday.

The camp follows two days of fitness testing at Colney Training Centre to kick-off their pre-season.

“We wanted to go to a place where your sole focus is on getting yourself in the best possible shape that you can, and that’s exactly what St George’s Park caters for,” Neil told canaries.co.uk.

“You go there to train and work hard. We will be together for 24/7 for the next five days, so it’s about getting the players in good shape and getting their minds focused.

“It’s about spending a bit of time together as well. I think it’s important – after we won the Play-Off Final, everyone shot off in their own direction to enjoy their summer. It’s important we get that unity back together as well.

“Everyone’s in great spirits because of the way we ended last season and the fact that we’re in the Premier League looking forward to those games.”

A selection of the squad will link up with the group from next week, including those who featured for their countries over the last month such as captain Russell Martin and midfielder Wes Hoolahan.

Neil is ready for his first pre-season schedule with the Canaries ahead of their top flight opener against Crystal Palace at Carrow Road on August 8.

“It’s something that I’m really looking forward to, bedding in more principles about how we’ll function as a group,” added City’s promotion-winning boss.

“I think it will help a lot. When you come in and work on things mid-season, when you’ve got games coming up, you don’t want to over-train them and give them too much information.

“To be fair, I thought they grasped it really well last year, and it won’t take long for all of that to come back and for them to start adding other layers as well.

“We’re going to new levels, we’re going to come across challenges we haven’t faced before. In those types of scenarios, we’ve got to know how to deal with them. We’ll be doing a lot of work on that.”

NORWICH CITY'S 2014-15 PRE-SEASON
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ALEX NEIL: EVERYONE'S IN GREAT SPIRITS

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