Robins boss Michael Duff spoke to the media after Wednesday's 2-2 pre-season friendly draw at Hereford.
Despite leading twice via goals from Will Boyle and George Lloyd, the Bulls managed to earn a draw at Edgar Street, in what was Cheltenham's second friendly ahead of the new season.
Duff saw the game as another opportunity to improve his team's fitness levels, with the pre-season calendar stepping up another level over the course of the next two weeks ahead of the big kick-off at Leyton Orient on Saturday 3 August.
"In the second half when we made all the changes it got a bit disruptive as you'd expect," Duff said. We've got young lads playing in positions where they're not used to playing but it's fitness. That's their fifth game Hereford so they're a bit ahead of us with regards to fitness and you probably saw that in the second half.
"We gave two poor goals away but I thought there was some good football played in between that. Physically we didn't compete as well as I would have liked against them as regards to coming out of tackles and things like that."
Midfielder Ryan Broom was substituted in the first half of the game and Duff was keen to reiterate the decision to take the former Bristol Rovers man off was precautionary.
"He had a bit of a tight hamstring. I took him off. He didn't feel anything but I didn't want him to feel anything, to pull it, so you can see we are a little bit thin on numbers at the minute so we're not taking any risks. He's a fit lad Broomy - he doesn't need the minutes so much."
Duff is now preparing his side for their next major outing with the club's first home pre-season friendly on Saturday when Premier League side Leicester City are the visitors. Tickets for the game are available to buy from the ticket office and online.
A squad will be travelling on Friday night to Southern Premier South side Taunton Town too. Kick-off against the Peacocks in Somerset is at 7.45pm.