But he likes the look of the foundations.
Southern opened the expanded-yet-shortened national league with as promising a loss as you will see on Sunday.
Defending champions Eastern Suburbs left Dunedin with three points after their 1-0 win — from a super strike from the talented Charlotte Wilford Carroll — but the home team and coach were left feeling reasonably happy.
"That was a good, close game," Ridley said yesterday.
"It was a great strike from a very good player that gave them the three points.
"Yes, it hurts to lose, but there’s the bigger picture to think about, and with that in mind I couldn’t be a prouder coach.
"We pushed the champions to the very end, and we move on."
Southern have lost seven players, including star forwards Chelsea Whittaker and Jasmine Prince, from last year’s team.
Ridley said that, plus the usual challenges of being a regional-based team from the South, put the performance against Eastern into perspective.
"I feel it is an unbelievable effort from the girls, coaches and all involved to produce what we did in game one with the time we had. How the girls stayed as organised as they did is something very commendable."
The national women’s league has been tweaked this season.
Two teams have been added but the league will be just a single round, meaning a drop from 14 games to just nine.
Southern, who finished a creditable fourth last year with five wins, five draws and four losses, will need to quickly turn promising efforts into points if they are to challenge at the right end of the table.
The performance against Eastern Suburbs, a club-based team as opposed to Southern’s regional base, indicated the gap to the better-resourced teams was not huge, Ridley said.
"We’ve trained for three weeks and them 25 weeks-plus," he said.
"We pretty much have to accept that we aren’t going to gel quickly enough to start game one at a level good enough to compete with these Auckland sides.
"Especially when having the hard task first up to try and beat the 2022 champions, who are a very well-coached side.
"Their rotations are great, and they have played a full season together this year, and our 16 were taking the field for the very first time together."
Southern United are away to the Phoenix Reserves this weekend.
