Football Still an enormous amount of work to do, says boss Barton
BRISTOL Rovers have an “enormous amount of work to do”, Joey Barton said after their pre-season draw with Plymouth Argyle on Saturday.
In soaring temperatures in BS7, Barton’s Gas came from a goal down to draw 1-1 with the League One Pilgrims.
Harry Anderson, making his first appearance since a move from Lincoln City, conceded a first-half penalty to Luke Jephcott, who put Plymouth ahead from the spot.
But immediately after the interval, Rovers won a spot-kick of their own thanks to Harvey Saunders chasing a lost cause, with Aaron Collins scoring his second goal of pre-season from 12 yards.
Barton was pleased with the workout, Rovers’ third game of their pre-season campaign, but he admits there is plenty of work left to be done before the opening day.
“The main thing is getting everyone through fit and getting the required minutes,” he said. “The key is Mansfield always being in mind, the first game of the season.
“A good test against a solid League One outfit. I’m really pleased with the performance, certainly second half we passed the ball a lot better.
“I still think we need to develop and move stuff on, but there were pleasing aspects.
“We’ve had a huge churn of players, a huge turnaround. I think it’s 11 new faces and a lot of people going out, with a lot of changes on the staff as well.
“So we have to ask for patience.
I still think we need to develop and move stuff on, but there were pleasing aspects
We can feel it building, but we’ve got an enormous amount of work to do. We’ve got to rebuild this from the ground up and pre-season is about putting foundations in.
“We’ve got three weeks further to go to the opening game, but we can certainly take a lot of positives from that game today.”
Rovers were missing a long list of senior players due to a mix of injuries and Covid protocols, and Barton is eager to get them back as soon as possible.
“We’ve still got six or seven out,” he said. “It’s a strange one. We have a number of key components to still come back in.
“Big Anssi (Jaakkola) was back in training on Thursday having been with Finland in the Euros. Hopefully Sammy Nicholson’s back in the building next week, he’s continuing his rehabilitation, Alex Rodman the same.
“Then we’ve got Paul Coutts and Sam Finley who were striving for their minutes, Luke Thomas as well. They all trained this morning and done a bit extra in terms of the running, but we didn’t think this was the right time to risk them in a game.
“I was a little bit unsure with Trevor (Clarke), Sion (Spence) and Harry (Anderson), but thankfully they’ve got through those 45 minutes unscathed.”