A tough afternoon for us as we fell to a 3–0 defeat away at Shrewsbury.
We struggled to really get a foothold in the game from the outset. Full credit to Shrewsbury – they are an excellent, professional set-up with some very good players. They all know their roles and execute them well, which made it difficult for us to build any real rhythm.
That said, I thought the first half showed a lot of character. We managed to frustrate them for long periods and caused a few problems ourselves on the counter-attack. We stayed organised, worked hard, and limited them despite the way they moved the ball. They shifted it well and switched play very, very effectively, which we had to constantly deal with.
In the second half, the game opened up a bit more and they showed their quality. The three goals they scored were outstanding and, in truth, unstoppable for our goalkeeper. They dominated possession and made it count when it mattered.
We were also down to the bare bones in terms of the squad. We didn’t have the options from the bench to really change things or inject fresh energy, and that lack of firepower meant we couldn’t influence the game in the way we would have liked. It definitely had an impact on how we managed the situation as the game went on.
Despite the result, our form since Christmas has been outstanding, so we’ll treat this as a small blip. The focus now is on getting back out on the training pitch this week, working hard, and preparing properly for a big semi-final against Chasetown on Sunday.
