Thorman will play against his brother Paul against London Skolars on Sunday

York City Knights start another new Championship 1 season on Sunday looking to mount another promotion challenge.

After last year's third place finish, followed by defeat to Oldham in the Final Eliminator, York begin at home to London Skolars on Sunday.

And assistant coach Chris Thorman told BBC Radio York: "We have a squad big and strong enough to achieve something really special this year."

Thorman insists that Knights are this time aiming at automatic promotion.

"I think we have a squad good enough to do that," he said. "I think we've trained well enough and, if we improve week on week, that's definitely a possibility.

All I'm bothered about is what we do in training and on the playing field Chris Thorman

"We're well aware there's a number of teams that want to do that and a number of teams that are capable of doing that.

"But like I've said since I came to the club, all I'm bothered about is what we do in training and on the playing field. "

The Knights have won two and lost one of their group games in the Northern Rail Cup. And Thorman admits that they need to continue improving as the season goes on.

"Obviously there's still plenty of stuff to work on," he said. "Ideally, you'd want to be peaking towards the end of the season.

"But I feel that we're in decent shape. No real injuries to talk about, although there were a couple of bruised bodies walking about the place last week.

"We've had plenty of chance to recover and we've had a good couple of sessions in between. We're in good shape for Sunday."

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