Welcome back everyone and thank you for coming out on a Tuesday night to see us take on Fleetwood.
I have to start by thanking you for your support on Saturday. It’s always easier to say that after a win but I honestly thought what you did on Saturday was brilliant. You know how important it is to get a win or two this week and when it was 0-0 you stuck with us, raised the volume and did all you could to lift the atmosphere and the team. I thank you for that and if you can create that atmosphere for a 0-0 draw with Oldham then I look forward to seeing and hearing what you can do for some of the big games we hope to have here in the coming years!
Over all, I think we were a little bit disappointed with just one point on Saturday. I certainly wasn’t disappointed with the attitude and the desire from the players, but we didn’t turn that into clear chances too many times. There were a couple of half chances, one or two near things, but we didn’t make their keeper work too hard for his clean sheet. Maybe that was down to a few jangling nerves, but it shouldn’t be because I have seen enough in my first four games to know that we are on the right lines.
I thought defensively we were excellent, not just the back four but everyone in front of them as well. We needed to tighten up at the back and I thought we did that really well. I have been pretty consistent in what I have said: it is going to take time to build things the way I want them here, but a clean sheet edged us further away from the chasing pack and that’s three games at home now, so step by step we are starting to move forward.
There is still a long way to go but we are already thinking about next season as well. I think that’s important because you can’t get stuck in a rut just moving game to game. You have to always be aware of where you want to get to in the future and you always have to be preparing and planning to make things better. I think the new training ground will be a massive step forward for the whole club and it is exciting to see the plans that Tiger has for this football club.
Obviously, the first priority is to ensure that those plans are achieved as a League 1 side next season. If we can get a win tonight it will be such a huge boost for everyone, but I have a lot of time for John Sheridan, who has done an excellent job at Fleetwood and will be meticulous in his planning for tonight’s game, as ever. It’s not going to be easy and there were one or two knocks from a very physical game on Saturday, but we have home advantage and we feel the performances have maybe deserved better reward so far. Hopefully everything we have been working so hard to achieve clicks into place tonight.
You can read the full programme online at www.matchdayfix.com/oufc.