Progressive coaching pair land first roles in senior management at ages of 23 and 24 as part of newly launched initiative between Gosport Borough and Petersfield Town

Suraci and Lea, aged just 23 and 24 respectively, have been appointed joint-managers of Wessex Division One outfit Petersfield Town for next season.

As part of an initiative launched between Gosport and the Rams, the Boro centre of excellence head coaches will continue in their current positions while also assuming management responsibilities at Love Lane from next month.

The newly formed relationship between the clubs is also being viewed as an opportunity for both Suraci and Lea to utilise and offer opportunities to Gosport's most promising under-23s and under-18s players in a senior level environment.

Current Petersfield boss Mark Summerhill will remain involved and work closely with the youthful incoming joint-management pair as head of football.

And Suraci is excited to have such a prominent role in a newly formed relationship, which both the Rams and Gosport believe can reap benefits in both the immediate and long term.‘The idea is, for me, we want to go in and stamp our own style on things, how we want to play,' Suraci said.

‘I think with Mark (Summerhill; head of football) in there as well, he's going to offer a lot of experience to me and Joe, having been manager this season. We'll work as almost a trio in we'll consult with Mark and he'll offer his advice.

‘It's a good opportunity but I think people get this thing about experience, I'm not sure how much that matters as such - experience is obviously important - but we're coming with our own ideas.

‘We've played for five or six years in non-league, we've got our own ideas on how things should be run, the standards to be set. We've played under a lot of different managers, we probably picked up some things we'd like to keep and certainly things we wouldn't like to keep.’

Gosport boss Gale, who had both Suraci and Lea as first-team players at the beginning of the season, is viewing it as a great move for all parties involved.

Ahead of Boro's Southern League Premier South trip to play-off chasing Chesham, he said: ‘What we can do is put our young players there (Petersfield) because I've now got two coaches who work at our football club as well running the team, along with Mark (Summerhill) - the manager there - who I've known a long, long time and trust him. It was an idea that me, Joe, Pat and the chairman (Iain McInnes) have been speaking about for a long time.

‘I just think it's progression. It works for their football club, it works for ours, they're a separate entity, so are we, but what it enables us to do is to send our best players, as in some of youngsters playing there, along with the Petersfield Town players - we're not going to disregard them - they've got some good players there as well. It works both ways, I think it'll be really good, I really do.’