Basic defending errors have cost us five goals

10:56am Thursday 21st August 2008

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WE always thought that going into League 1 was going to be a tough challenge and the opening eight days of the season have emphasised that.

In analysing why we have started with three defeats, I am disappointed with at least five out of the six goals that have gone in against us.

All were stoppable; all were down to some pretty basic defending errors, irrespective of what level our opponents play at.

After the Leyton Orient match, where I felt we were very deep defensively - almost on top of the goalkeeper at times - we worked on that in training on the Monday and it showed a considerable improvement in the game against Crystal Palace where we denied them any sight of goal for the first 44 minutes.

To concede a bad goal right on half-time and then another one soon after half-time just made it very much an uphill struggle.

Then we come to Yeovil who were a hard-working, organised side but should not have posed us the sort of problems that they did.

Again, the first goal was very preventable.

The work will go on throughout this week to prevent the problems that have arisen, particularly our defensive shortcomings at the moment.

We always say we defend as a team, just as we attack as a team, and so blame will not be isolated to just the goalkeeper or back four.

We have to learn to be more difficult to play against and we have to be more ruthless when the ball is there to be won.

I have always been an advocate of being disciplined as a team and not conceding free-kicks. They just allow the opposition to bring up the big central defenders and pump balls into the box.

On the basis that a high percentage of goals are scored from set-pieces, those are preventable.

However, I do see the need for more aggression about the team in pressing the ball and more aggression about the team in winning our headers and tackles.

Yeovil, at times, gave us a lesson in that.

When the ball was there to be won, they went right through their tackles and made sure they won them.

I cannot fault too many players for not working hard enough; what John Trewick and I have to do is to direct that hard work to greater effect.

We have experienced several seasons of good results, now is the testing time within the camp.

What we look for are the strong characters in the team to come to the fore and drag everybody along with them.

Results will come, I am convinced of that, but it will take a lot of hard work and character to achieve our aims.