DAVE JONES is aiming to Norse whip his men into shape for the new campaign with a tough pre-season programme.

Saints have lined up a five-game tour of Norway including provisional clashes with top sides Molde and Viking Stavanger. Venues and exact details have still to be confirmed and will be announced later.

And for the first time in eight years the club will be playing one of their warm-up matches at The Dell.

They host Lierse who have just reached the Belgian Cup final with a 5-3 aggregate win over Genk. The game has been pencilled in for Wednesday, July 28 (7.30) as the return fixture from last year's 2-2 draw in Lier.

Saints wind up at Reading on Saturday, July 31 before kicking off their Premiership programme on the weekend of August 7.

The season starts a week earlier to allow for the Euro 2000 finals next summer so the players report back on July 1 and play their first game on July 13 in a double-header at both Aldershot and Kingstonian.

Jones explained: "We will split the first-team players evenly between the two venues. It is a way of giving everyone a run-out and it will be purely for fitness to get the lungs open and the legs mov-ing. Then we go to Norway for what will be a demanding tour against some quality opposition.

"We had the chance to go to Portugal but we felt we would have tougher games in Scandinavia and the climate is right.

"At that stage the emphasis will be mainly on fitness and by the time we play Lierse and Reading we will be looking at tactics and formation ready for our opening game.

"It is vital that we get off to a good start for once - but then I am not saying anything different to every previous manager.

"We are going back over previous seasons to try and work out why this club always has a bad start. They have tried staying home, going abroad, playing easy games or tough ones and we always start slowly. At the end of the day it comes down to the players.

"This season we started even more slowly than usual and gave ourselves a mountain to climb."

Saints will be hoping the re-match with Lierse is not as explosive as last year's 2-2 draw which the referee infamously declared would be played under Belgian rules.

He then sent off Carlton Palmer and John Beresford but not a Lierse defender who committed a clear professional foul!

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