League break brings boost to confidence

VIEW FROM THE CLAYTON END

AS we thought it might do, the cups provided us with some welcome respite after the shellacking that we’ve taken in the league over the past month or so. It was important to win on Saturday, even if it’s against a pretty dismal Cheltenham side who we are head and shoulders better than.

It’ll do the lads some good, God knows how it must feel to be sat in a dressing room low on confidence.

We progressed in the farce that is the Checkatrade Trophy on Tuesday as well.

Jonny Maxted continued his status as penalty saving machine for another shoot-out at least. I didn’t go to the game but there was a comfortably put aside Barnsley last week, who comfortably did the same to us a week before that.

They’re flying high, and the sheer size of the club is just a little bit daunting to say the least.

Realistically, I wouldn’t be surprised if 4,000 scary Mackems turn up to the Crown Ground to try and get in.

If I was a fan of a club that size, I’d probably do the same.

Take the Barnsley atmosphere and stick another 500 people on it, this one will be an occasion.

The club will cope as the club always seems to cope, relatively well.

Sure, there’ll be 500 away fans still waiting to be searched at 3pm and it’ll seem massively over sold, but, the club are quite good at lining their pockets these days with events like this. And fair play to them for that.

What I don’t want to see too much of is the elongated love festival that seemed to take place when we welcomed The Tykes.

They patted us on the head and said: ‘oh, aren’t you a lovely little club. Thanks for the win and hopefully you’ll manage to stay up’.

Well, sack that all off for me. Are we here as equals or as tourists?

We’re not in a position to be passengers to these teams and we need to stamp our authority in games.

We always get early chances, we must take them this time around.

Massive away followings can very quickly turn toxic when it’s not going their way and a couple of early goals will turn their jolly day out in Accrington into a certified nightmare.

Players nervous on the ball, mistakes being made, that sort of thing.

Let’s make it as horrible as we can for their 11 and make our voices heard.

We are Accrington Stanley, show them exactly what they’ve walked in to come kick off on Saturday.