ADIE Mings has revealed that striker Ben Highmore will miss the start of the new season.

The pacy forward, who turns 25 today, has been working in Canada and will be out of the country when Chippenham kick-off their new campaign at Hednesford Town on August 14.

“Ben phoned me and said that he won’t be back until September,” said the Bluebirds boss.

“I’ve got three other good forwards and Mike Perrott and Ashley Edenborough can both pay up-front as well, so we won’t be short.

“Players are becoming available all the time, and if someone with that bit of quality turns up then we may have a look at them.”

Summer signings Perrott, Edenborough and Nathan Rudge all featured as Chippenham’s first home friendly of the closed season ended in a 3-0 defeat to Conference Premier outfit Newport County on Tuesday night.

Robbie Matthews, Craig Frater and a Steve Casey own goal sealed the win for last season’s runaway Conference South champions.

“The result’s immaterial – they had that bit more class but I thought we did well in patches and it was a really good run-out,” said Mings.