Reds’ big finish dependent on away form fix
JOHN Coleman insists Accrington Stanley must shake off their away day blues if they are to finish the League One season strongly.
The Reds were thumped 4-0 by ten-men Portsmouth at Fratton Park last weekend, making it five successive defeats on the road.
Stanley last won away from home at Lincoln in November and, while home form has been positive, Coleman’s men have been poor on their travels.
The Reds take on Charlton at the Wham Stadium tomorrow before taking on Sheffield Wednesday at Hillsborough next Tuesday.
Coleman said his players would not dwell on the defeat at Pompey – but would look to improve their record on the road.
“We’ll never be in the habit of sulking, so we’ll work hard and try to prepare for the next game,” he said.
“We’ve got to come up with a gameplan for Saturday, having no midweek game (this week) gives us a chance to digest the Portsmouth game, go through it with the players and see where we can improve.
“We’ve got this thing hanging over us now that we can only win at home, we can’t win away and we’re poor away from home – and the stats back that up. We have to try and get away from that, we have six more away games and we’ve got to try to win them and the only way you’re going to win them is by playing positive football, and at this moment in time we’re not doing that. Portsmouth didn’t have to be very good to beat us, because we were so wasteful and the architects of our own downfall.
‘They were good, so when it gets to that stage you’re in trouble. We have to stop being architects of our own downfall, we have to be better on the ball, show a bit more urgency defensively and attacking-wise and all over we have got to improve.
“We don’t seem to have that problem at home and I’m probably not the only manager who’s gone through this, I think plenty of managers have in the past.
“As the old saying goes, the harder you work the luckier you get, so we have got to try working harder.”
Coleman is hoping the first away win will bring about a change in mentality and see an improvement in results on the road. But in the meantime he insists the players must keep trying their best to turn around away form.
“That’s what we’re hoping, but we’ve got to keep trying,” he said. “When you give up you’ve got no chance of winning and we won’t give up, that’s for sure. We’ll give our all and try to get something out of each game that we play.
“There’s no excuses – Portsmouth were better than us on the day. They were far more clinical and took their chances.
“They had four shots on target and scored four times. We have got this thing at the moment where we more or less beat ourselves.
“Portsmouth were better than us so well done to them, but we have got to improve all over the park.
“Their first goal was a cheap goal to give away.
Then they go to 10 men and we know we are going to have all the ball and we concede from two set plays – we’re the second best at defending set-plays in the league. I don’t think we’d conceded for about twelve games from set plays, so to concede two in one game, against ten men, you can’t legislate for that.
“We were so disjointed with our play and this is the third game away from
home where we haven’t scored.
“In those three games we have had 68 shots, so if you’re having 68 shots and not scoring you’re doing something wrong.
“We had 25 shots and only six of them on target on target. Portsmouth had 11, four on target and won by four goals.
“That’s an unbelievably good strike rate from them and an unbelievably poor one from us.
“We can’t say we didn’t have chances, because we did, we were just wasteful - and when Portsmouth dropped off us when they went down to ten we were wasteful in possession, took too long on the ball, took too long to decide what to do and they looked quite solid.
“We played into their hands a bit with the balls we put into the box.”
Ironically, what was arguably Stanley’s most impressive away win of the campaign so far came against this weekend’s opponents, Charlton.
The Reds were 3-2 winners at the Valley in October and the Addicks parted company with manager Nigel Adkins after that game.
Johnnie Jackson took over but is currently without a win in the last six games, having lost five of them.