City of Liverpool manager Paul McNally says Kidsgrove Athletic will not easy clash as they visit Vesty Road this weekend.
They visit Merseyside looking to continue their impressive start to the season. Despite losing just once in the campaign, they have won twice, drawing their remaining six.
The Purps couldn’t make it two wins in as many weekends over Trafford after they were defeated 3-2, bringing an end to their winning run.
“We have to keep to look attacking teams, to build a bit of momentum, we know it’s going to be a tough game, they’ve only been beaten once in this league,” he told Off The Park.
“They’ve got six draws so it shows they’re a tough team to beat, we know they’re not going to be pushovers and we go in with our eyes wild open and see where it takes us on Saturday, hopefully it brings us three points.
“That’s the million-dollar question, I don’t think many teams have broke them down, it’ll just be a case of seeing what we can do,” McNally added on whether he has a recipe to break down a team who’s only defeat came to the hands of Macclesfield.
“We have got a flurry of attacking options, goals aren’t our problem now which they were, now it’s about can we stop goals going in? Can we be a little bit tighter? Looking at it now, it’ll probably be a 0-0 draw but see where we take us, if we can be defensively resolute I’m confident we’ll always score.
“We’ve got to build on that first, keep them out, we’re at home we’re wanting to play up to the crowd and give them something to cheer.”
Against Hanley and in their home meeting with Trafford, City of Liverpool started fast racing into a three-goal lead before their opponents answered back with two late goals to make for a nervy ending.
Their slow start to their trip against the North proved costly as they moved into a 3-1 lead before the Purps’ fightback – but it wasn’t enough to earn a draw.
McNally, as a result, wants a solid performance. He said: “I want us to put in 90 minutes rather than 60 minutes or 45 minutes. I want us to put in a more solid performance and when we’re not on the front foot can we defend?
“Can we put our foot in? Can we defend in numbers? Can we do the things teams do when things aren’t going so well? Then we are going well, make them count, look to get a result at the end of the day.”
On their defeat last time out, McNally continued: “I don’t think it was deserved on the second-half performance, on the first, I don’t think we got going. I think we were a bit too passive, we didn’t really get going and by that time we were 2-1 down.
“The first 10 minutes after half-time, they scored a goal because we were a bit more attacking and had a bit more attacking intent, they’ve gone 3-1 and we’ve gone even more attacking but on the shade of play, I think we could’ve deserved a draw.
“But look, it was a similar story to last week, they could’ve argued they deserved a point at least week. I think it’s swung round and bit us on the backside.”
We set up no different but I think the mentality of how we played, maybe because we were away from home maybe some lads were probably not as on the front foot as they would be at home. I think Trafford were a bit buoyant because of the last game but there’s a short turnaround in games, it’s seven days between the last game and this one, maybe they thought they were in the ascendancy we knew they’d come at us. We tried to sit in but no defended well, how they should do when you’re away from home. When you’re away from home, you’re expected to be resolute and look to pinch one on the break but we didn’t even do that, we didn’t defend properly so I’ve got no qualms on the result.
