Town will play Slovakian side Spartak Trnava in a friendly during their pre-season trip to Austria.

The game against Spartak is set to take place on Saturday 15th July at the end of the week’s training camp at a venue still to be confirmed.

Town had initially been lined-up to play an Austrian side but the Slovak Super Liga team revealed that they will now be the Blues' opponents in the only game of the trip.

Five-times Czechoslovak champions and 1969 European Cup semi-finalists Spartak are the current Slovak Cup holders and finished third in the Slovak Super Lig in 2022/23.

They won the Slovak Slovak Super Liga title in 2018 and Slovak Cup in 2019, 2022 as well as this year.

Boss Kieran McKenna was keen to take Town to Austria in the summer of 2022 but the Blues opted not to make the trip due to concerns regarding the Covid situation and instead spent time at Loughborough University.

Speaking just prior to the final game of the season at Fleetwood, McKenna confirmed that Town would be looking to organise a pre-season camp in Austria this summer.

“Yes, it’s in our thoughts,” he said. “Those plans have been in place for a few months, but you can’t rubberstamp any plans until you know when your season’s going to finish, and our season might have finished on May 31st [had Town been in the play-offs].

“Now we know when we finish, we know when we’re going to start back and we’re just trying to confirm plans at the moment for when we might go abroad for a tour and also for our friendlies.”

The Blues' last pre-season trip abroad was to Germany in the summer of 2019 prior to the pandemic.

Photo: Matchday Images

TractorfactorSteve added 16:26 - May 23 Look forward to a tour in Cyprus during a future pre season!
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SpiritOfJohn added 16:59 - May 23 Slovak Slovak Super Liga - so good they named it twice ;)
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JewellintheTown added 08:09 - May 24 @SpiritofJohn - Its to distinguish it from the Polish, Hungarian, English, Welsh, Austrian & Peckham Slovak Super Liga
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Bazza8564 added 12:58 - May 24 I suspect the Austrian leg of pre season will be a significant one in terms of training. KM likes it there because of the air quality, it's something the top PL clubs gauge to work out where best to go to get their players in shape. Another one of his great traits from his Man United experience i suspect. We've previously been to Ireland, (MM liked the Guinness?) it's good to see good processes in place. Personally I'm hoping that at some point we might take a trip to the US because of the link up with Phoenix Rising, although Arizona in June probably suits the drinking habits of some of us thirstier fans than player wellbeing :)

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AustriaBlue added 19:11 - May 24 A game in my back yard ( hopefully- as Austria is quite long from east to west). Looking forward very much,. Probably going to go with my Slovakian friends. The Slovak team have to be better than my local Austrian Bundesliga team, which makes League 1 play look like Champions League at times.
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