Risk brings reward as Ardley hails bit of magic from Enzio
MANAGER TOLD MAGPIES TO BE PATIENT IN WIN AGAINST MOORS
NOTTS County are back in the National League play-off positions after their 2-0 home win against Solihull Moors on Wednesday night.
Kyle Wootton scored both goals in the second half and Magpies manager Neal Ardley was pleased to see his players’ patience pay off.
Here’s what he said after the game:
■■Was that worth the wait?
Of course, the players had to try to get a result, after all the hard work that’s gone into getting the game on.
I was surprised, I thought we’d be a bit more open, I thought they’d come and have a go at us and try and dominate possession because that’s what they do.
So it became apparent after about 10 to 15 minutes that they were 5-4-1 and stopping passing lines, trying to catch us on the break.
It made it really difficult. And the players were getting a little bit frustrated just before half-time and forcing things.
And I just told them they had to be patient.
But when we got into that final third, we just had to take more risks.
We need to have more domination one-on-one, more crosses, more people on the move. And I thought we did that a little bit more in the second half.
■■How difficult is it to get the balance right between patience and taking risks?
I thought we forced it at times. At times we tried to play a 35-yard ball in behind in the first half and that’s forcing it a little bit when they’re still in their shape.
But then there’s times when you’ve worked into wide areas and it’s on to slide someone down the side or try and get at someone in a one v one.
That’s the bit we wanted to add to the performance and commit to crossing the ball a bit more.
I thought we got in crossing areas but came back out because they were still in their shape.
But we did that a bit better in the second half.
And obviously we needed a bit of magic to break down a 5-4-1.
We needed a bit of magic and I said at half-time let’s have a bit more one v one domination and Enzio Boldewijn has produced it.
■■That’s what Enzio can give you at times. And that was what was
needed to break down a really disciplined defensive performance wasn’t it?
We’ve got Ruben Rodrigues, Enzio Boldewijn and Cal Roberts who are players who can dominate and make something happen.
That’s why we brought Ruben on and we had kept Enzio on the pitch just because it might make something happen.
That’s what it was going to need. It was brilliant.
To produce the driving run which took him into the penalty area and then the weight of the pass and composure to slide Kyle in, it was perfect.
■■Why was Rodrigues the right man to bring on at that point and why didn’t he start?
We thought the game was going to be on Tuesday. We didn’t find out that it was going to be put back to Wednesday until Monday afternoon so Monday morning was the only opportunity I had to work on this game originally.
Ruben was still very fatigued. He had cramp, he had muscle soreness, he had sore ribs from Saturday’s game, and I thought I would struggle to get the same level of performance so soon after that game.
We set the team up and did our
work on a 50x50 area that we’d cleared snow off on the training ground.
When the game gets put back it wouldn’t be right as a manager then to go I’m going to change the team now and everything I’ve worked on.
■■Do you think that you need Kyle Wootton to hit 20 goals or something like that this season to achieve your ambitions?
We need him to stay fit because he’s an important player on top of his goals. And then we need the rest of the team team to add further goals like we did last season.
At the start of the season, we would have said Cal is going to get double figures. We lost Kristian Dennis and his 15 goals, then Wes Thomas, who scored 10 to 12 goals, so to have none of them available, you then need Jimmy Knowles, Eli Sam, Enzio and Ruben to chip in with goals.
That’s not easy when people have just come in and they’re finding their feet.
And the good news is as a team, we’re really solid. And the defence has kept a lot of clean sheets and that gives us a good platform to try and get momentum.