Cooper eyes more goals

FOREST Green Rovers manager Mark Cooper has urged his team to keep doing what they are doing – despite their attacking woes this season.

While Rovers boast the best defensive record in League Two, only Stevenage and Walsall, towards the bottom of the table, have scored fewer goals.

Last weekend’s 0-0 draw at home to Stevenage was Forest Green’s second in a row, but Cooper urged his team to not be “too bothered” about their lack of end product.

“We train like we want to score, but it just hasn’t happened. If we get too bothered about it, we’ll get even tighter in front of goal,” Cooper told BBC Radio Gloucestershire.

“We’re not doing anything much different to last year, it’s just one of those things. We’re keeping clean sheets, we’re defending really well, we know we have to score more goals. Simple as that.

“We’ve not changed the way we worked. We encourage the boys to get forward, have bodies in the box, make sure we shoot, make sure we put crosses in the box. But for one reason or another, at the moment, that bit has not clicked, but the defensive side of it has.”

Forest Green visit EFL new boys Salford City today with on-loan Kyle Taylor suspended, while Kevin Dawson also misses the game with a calf problem.

Matt Mills has missed the last five games with a hamstring problem but could return to the team, and James Morton is likely to be back after missing the Stevenage game through suspension.

Salford sit in 17th place in the table and Cooper knows how hard the transition from the National League to the Football League can be, with his experience after Rovers’ promotion in 2017.

“As we know ourselves, coming up from the National League, it can be difficult. Giving the boys who got you promoted the chance or whether you bring new guys in,” Cooper said.

“They’ve had some good results, they’ve had some not-so-good ones, but I’m sure somewhere along the line they’ll climb up the table.”

Fourth-placed Swindon Town – lying right between West Country rivals Cheltenham and Forest Green in the League Two table – will aim to continue their promotion bid when they host Newport today.

However, the Welsh side are just three points and three places behind Swindon and have already won in the West Country this season – 2-0 at Forest Green last month.

Simon Pizzey Mark Cooper’s frustration was evident during last week’s goalless draw with Stevenage