Source: FOOTYMAD
Southend United's Paul Sturrock and Accrington Stanley's John Coleman
Both managers have their say before the League Two clash between Shrimpers and the Accys at Roots Hall Saturday; one worried about scoring goals, the other stopping them! Sturrock: The Shrimpers have had no trouble creating chances in recent games, it's putting them away that seems to the main problem, and Blues boss Paul Sturrock wants to start seeing his side put that right, starting with the Stanley saturday afternoon. Sturrock told www.echo-news.co.uk: "When we miss chances our heads seem to sometimes go down and we've been trying to sort that out on the training ground. People must have the right mentality to score goals and we've been emphasising that. I'm quite content with the number of chances we're making but what concerns me is that we're not taking them. We need confidence in front of goal, a bit of arrogance and people being positive too." Fair enough Luggs, and the training has certainly focused on that.And this could be a good time to face Stanley, who though they are grabbing a few goals themselves, are letting them in at the other end at a greater rate. Sturrock continued: "Accrington are a very difficult side to play. They have a lot of pace and movement. They score a lot of goals and are dangerous but if we take our performance from the other night in to tomorrow's game then we're confident we can get the result we want. They do have a similar points tally to us though so it's going to be close."Coleman: Meanwile, Stanley boss John Coleman is facing the opposite of Luggy's problems, he wants to see his side stop giving goals away, especially after a start that saw them concede just one goal in the first six weeks of league two football but now fall to a point and two places behind the Blues!Coleman told www.accringtonstanley.co.uk: "We're still trying to hammer home the way we want the lads to play. I think in the main they do realise what we want them to do but I think that in the past we've made the mistake of not reinforcing it. We've got to reinforce it and keep reinforcing it until it becomes second nature."That's a lot of reinforcing, so good luck John; however, his team are yet to win away from home but have had very credible goalless draws at Northampton, Oxford and Torquay, not bad.Coleman continued: "Anyone that tries to bombard you can't bombard you without the ball, unless they start throwing rocks at you! We still want to score goals and we still want to win games but the problem is that we've conceded too many goals in the last three years. That's stopped us getting where we want to be, which is close to the playoffs or in the playoffs."So it's possession stupid!Coleman concluded: "If you start turning possession over cheaply you start not picking up men and you start not getting tight to people eventually you'll get punished and that's what's happened to us in recent weeks. We've got to get back to what we were doing early on, which was keeping good possession, pressing high up the field and the defenders staying with people right to the death. That's something that we can keep reinforcing."That reinforcing again John, let's see if it gets through to his players at the weekend!
