“Enjoy where we are, support the club and let’s all continue to work together.”

That’s the message to Cheltenham Town’s fans from club chairman David Bloxham as they look forward to a third successive season in League One.

They start at Shrewsbury Town on Saturday 5^th August, host Bolton Wanderers a week later before travelling to Reading (15^th August) and Portsmouth (19^th August).

It’s fair to say the fixture list could have been kinder to Wade Elliott’s men but Bloxham, who took on his current role ahead of the 2021/22 season after a period as interim chairman, told The Local Answer: “To be honest every game in League One is tough.

“We had a very tough start last season – Peterborough, Barnsley and Portsmouth – hopefully we’ll get some points early on.

“Going to Shrewsbury on the opening day will certainly be interesting now that Micky Moore [former Cheltenham director of football] is there. Reading will also be interesting, we’ve never been there for a league game before.”

Reading were relegated from the Championship at the end of last season and the fact that Cheltenham are now rubbing shoulders with a club who competed in the Premier League in 2012/13 and whose all-seater stadium can hold more than 24,000 shows just how far they have come in recent times.

They finished 16^th last season with 54 points, one place and two points below where they ended the previous campaign, which was the best in their 136-year history.

It was Elliott’s first in charge following the departure of Michael Duff, and Bloxham continued: “It was a very good season, we nearly matched the season before. It was Wade’s first season as a head coach, it was a bit of a learning curve but we improved as the season went on. It was a good outcome.

“I don’t think there are too many people outside Cheltenham who expected us to stay in League One for a third season.”

That is surely true. A quick look at the fixture list for 2023/24 shows that there are some seriously big clubs in the division with the likes of Derby, Charlton, Blackpool and Wigan, as well as Bolton and Reading all lying in wait for Cheltenham.

Bloxham, who has been on the club’s board of directors since 2015, is realistic about the club’s prospects, but equally the club are certainly not there just to make up the numbers.

“We know we’re not going to win the title with 101 points,” he said. “What we’re aiming to do is to continue to try to be a little bit better year on year. If we can get 55 to 60 points and finish 12^th, 13^th, 14^th, 15^th, that would be a good season.”

Bloxham is absolutely right, of course, but if they are to get close to 60 points they will have to do it without free-scoring striker Alfie May following his departure to Charlton for a six-figure sum.

Some of that money was effectively spent in advance at the beginning of the year when the club brought in forward Aidan Kenna, a £50,000 capture from Sligo Rovers, and the money from the May deal will go into the club’s overall budget.

“We have a carefully prepared budget, it’s a club budget so some of the money will go on playing and staff wages,” explained Bloxham.

Twenty-four year-old Kenna made an impressive start to his time at Cheltenham, chipping in with six goals, and there are also big hopes for new striker Robert Street who has signed a three-year contract after leaving Crystal Palace.

The 21-year-old was on loan at Shrewsbury last season and Bloxham said: “We’re also hoping that the midfielders can score a few goals and the defenders can contribute some goals too.”

That’s what Elliott will be hoping for, of course, and when it comes to footballing matters, Bloxham, who played for Shipton Oliffe’s second team in the Cheltenham League for almost 20 years, stays very much on the sidelines.

“I’m a fan, I’m not a football expert,” he explained. “I leave all the football decisions to the football experts. My job is to support them and help them to implement the strategy.”

Cheltenham-born Bloxham is a specialist Employment Solicitor at Christopher Davidson Solicitors in Cheltenham so leads a busy life, and he is very grateful to his employers for the time they allow him to devote to Cheltenham Town.

“I go down to the training ground for half-an-hour most Friday mornings,” he said. “I say hello to the lads, speak to some of the staff and pop my head round the management team’s door.

“I never go into the changing room before a game. After a game, win or lose, I might see the manager and say ‘well done’ or ‘hard luck’.”

Bloxham, who lives just outside Cheltenham, has been a long-time supporter of Cheltenham Town and has been in and around football long enough to retain a cool head when things get tough.

“There were a couple of times last season,” he said. “There were one or two patches when results were disappointing and you have to hold your nerve, believe in what you’re doing.

“If you look at it statistically, changing the whole management team doesn’t usually work. It’s also expensive.

“That’s not our way, that’s not something we as a club tend to do.

“When I go down to the training ground I can see how the players and staff are, you can assess the atmosphere and react accordingly. It’s when people become unhappy or disillusioned that things get much more difficult.”

A run of three wins and a draw in March certainly made the end-of-season run-in much more comfortable – Cheltenham only lost two of their last 13 games – and that run provides hope for the new season.

Bloxham is certainly optimistic and why wouldn’t he be? The club won the League Two title when he was vice-chairman and since taking over as chairman have comfortably retained their place in the League One on two occasions.

So if there was a trophy for League One chairman of the season, Bloxham may be in the running!

“That’s very kind of you to say so,” he said laughing. “But I’m just one of seven people on the board so I can only take a little of the credit for one-seventh of the running the club. All the board members are local people and they all work incredibly hard.

“We are a good, community club. It’s all about having the right attitudes, helping each other and trying to achieve.

“We want to raise the status of the club so that we can be considered an established League One club.”