Bedford ready to meet 'physical challenge' as they face Saints

The fixture will be Saints' first friendly of the summer, with their second coming against Ospreys in Bridgend six days later.

The games will give the black, green and gold players a chance to show what they are made of under the guidance of new director of rugby Phil Dowson.

And Bedford are expecting Saints to bring the heat on Saturday.

"The biggest thing will be the intensity of the game," Woolford said.

"We're going to be their first game in pre-season and they will obviously have a slightly bigger squad than us.

"They've been preparing with a new regime and a new set of players so for them it's going to be quite an exciting time.

"But for us, it's just about meeting that physical challenge and it's something we did really well here last year (Saints won 40-21 at Bedford last September) for the first 50 or 60 minutes before the game got away from us a bit.

"If we can meet that challenge we should be in for an entertaining game."

Woolford started his career in Saints' Senior Academy and went on to play for the first team on a handful of occasions.

He is now a regular fixture in the Blues side and is looking forward to squaring up to some of his friends this weekend.

"Obviously I started my career at Saints and it's a brilliant club to play rugby at," the 29-year-old said.

"I've got a lot of good friends there and I know a lot of the coaching staff from my time there.

"For us, nothing changes, it's just another game and it's an exciting challenge - one we're all looking forward to."

Bedford got their pre-season campaign off to a flying start last weekend as they beat Rotherham Titans 61-19 at Goldington Road.

And Woolford said: "It was a good first hit-out and we actually did some of the fancier stuff really well.

"Our set piece was really good and when we got the ball in turnover and transition we were really effective.

"Some of the work-ons we've not been able to replicate too much in training has been the nitty gritty breakdown stuff.

"It's getting into the arm wrestle that we've struggled to do, but it was a good test against Rotherham and it will go up a level this weekend."