THIS picture shows a scuffle in Worcester Raiders’ feisty pre-season friendly with Tuffley Rovers at Glevum Park.

But Raiders manager Karl Gormley dismissed the fracas as “handbags” and insisted his side had worked hard to improve their discipline this summer.

The incident broke out after a “nasty” tackle on Raiders’ Kirk Layton by Rovers’ Mark Pritchett just before half-time.

Gloucestershire-based Severn Sport, which was covering the match, claimed “all but the keepers” got involved in the skirmish.

But Gormley said: “It wasn’t a fight.

“It was a little bit of a coming together between players.

“One of their players went in for a tackle on one of our lads. It was a nasty tackle.

“With what happened to Logan (Stoddart who suffered a double leg break in pre-season) our lads are a bit touchy with tackles at the minute.

“A few of their players and a few of our lads went over but it was over in a few seconds. It was handbags.”

Dan Flowers was also sin-binned in the second half for dissent on the hour mark and Raiders paid the price as Rovers struck twice moments later.

Roland Krol bagged a late consolation goal for the visitors in the 2-1 defeat.

Gormley added: “We have worked really hard to try to get a grip on the discipline side of things.

“It is football so you are not going to completely stop everything but the lads have been really good in pre-season and we will try to take that into the league.”

Promoted Raiders begin their West Midlands League Premier Division season on Saturday at Dudley Town (3pm).