Lyttle adamant players won’t relax despite gap
GER Lyttle says there is no way he will allow his Sligo Rovers players rest on their laurels, regardless of the eight point gap between themselves and Limerick.
Rovers face an arduous task in trying to tame Cork City at Turner’s Cross on Friday night. While Limerick, who still occupy the relegation play-off spot, host Dundalk.
Lyttle masterminded a vital win by the Lee last season and says his players will be going all out to secure another positive result on Friday.
“There’s no way on earth we’ll be allowing the players to settle”, he commanded.
“Not a hope in hell! We would be stupid to do that. The boys will be training as hard as they can. We want to finish on a high and put a many points on the board as possible. We’ll go to Cork in a positive frame of mind and see what we can get.”
Rovers had no game at the weekend due to their early exit from the FAI Cup, but did lose to league leaders Dundalk last Monday.
Michael Duffy and Pat Hoban scored either side of half-time to sentence Rovers to an eleventh defeat at the Showgrounds this term.
Reflecting on the game, Lyttle said: “To be fair to Dundalk, we matched them for large parts of the game. The key difference were the players and you look at their bench. They have players who can step up to the mark at any time. Michael Duffy is probably the best player in the league. He’s taken his goal really well and obviously they have Pat Hoban too, who’s their top goalscorer.
“We probably should have showed him down the left side and closed the space. But we allowed him the space on his right side and the only thing he could do was try and bend it around Mitchell which he did. It was a good goal but it was preventable. For the second goal, I think we’ve lost our concentration at the corner and he’s had a free header, but we didn’t deserve to be one down at half-time. We’ve had a few good chances and looked the more threatening at times. But we weren’t clinical enough and they’ve edged it.”
Lyttle said his young players will have learned a lot from the experience.
“Stephen (Kenny) was over straight away to tell me how well he thought we played, how much we’ve improved and how good we can be. We have a very young team out there, you have to remember that. You’ve Jack Keaney and John Mahon who went up against some of the best players in the league and they’ve matched them for large parts of the game.”
The Belfast man also paid tribute to Raff Cretaro whose introduction in the 70th minute was his 432nd league appearance for Rovers, beating the record previously held by club legend Tony Fagan for almost 30 years.
“Raff is a credit to everyone and a pleasure to work with”, Lyttle concluded.
“He deserves everything he achieves.”