Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Edwards is targeting a win back on home soil
FOREST Green Rovers head coach Rob Edwards believes his table-topping players will all be “refreshed and ready to go” following a week without a game and three consecutive away matches prior to that.
The Green Devils have hit their stickiest patch of the season, having not won any of their last five League Two matches, but away draws at Newport and Salford have steadied the ship and they still enjoy an eightpoint advantage over second-placed Northampton at the summit.
Rovers host out-of-form Bradford at the New Lawn this afternoon and boss Edwards said: “We’re looking forward to being back in front of our fans. It’s a place where we’ve been strong this season and we’ve picked up a lot of points.
“We’re coming off the back of two good performances as well. I know we haven’t won those games, but it was two good away points against Newport and Salford, so we’re coming into it on good form.
“We want to get back to winning ways and that goes without saying. What concerns me is performances, and the performances over the last two games have been really pleasing.
“Going back five games to Sutton away, that was a well-earned point. There wasn’t much in the game.
“We then had two defeats where I had no complaints. It was the first time we’d lost two games in a row all season. The last 25 minutes against Crawley was getting back to our normal performance levels, then Newport and Salford, although it was disappointing to concede first in the manner that we did, performances were very good and we showed character and quality.
“On another day, we could have won both of those games.
“The performances are my main concern. Results are vital at this stage of the season, but I’d be worried if we weren’t getting results and we were performing badly. That would be a real concern, but it’s not the case. We’ll continue to work hard and get performances right.”
Bradford are managed by Mark Hughes, who handed Edwards his Wales debut when he was in charge of the national side.
Edwards continued: “I’m really looking forward to it. It’ll be a pleasure for me to see him again, and it’s a pleasure to go up against Mark and his team.”
Swindon are just outside the League Two play-off places in eighth and host second-from-bottom side Oldham today.
Head coach Ben Garner, however, has noted that Oldham have begun to grind out points in their bid to escape the drop zone.
“They’ve done really well in recent weeks, they lost last week to Carlisle, but prior to that they had a really good run, I think seven unbeaten,” Garner said.
“They’ve put a system in place, they’ve been hard to beat, they’ve scored some good goals.
“You can see that they’re really fighting for each other and fighting for every point.”